In Early Summer a family faces a time of transition and growth as the twenty-eight-year-old daughter's unmarried status seems to reach a crisis point with everyone wanting her married off, even her boss plays matchmaker! This poor "old maid" seems quite happy enough working, hanging out with her friends, and helping her family, but society norms being what they were, she understands her time of being single is fast running out.

Ozu slowly takes his time setting up the characters and family dynamics in his usual aesthetic manner. The plot is not complex but the relationships are. Noriko is the "old maid" and seems fairly nonplussed when her boss tries to match her with an older friend of his. Her authoritarian brother, Koichi, jumps at the chance for her to be married to a wealthy older man. Noriko's mother and sister-in-law express their doubts about the match when they hear the man is forty. Koichi shuts them down saying that at Noriko's age, beggars can't be choosers.

When Koichi's two young sons run away after an argument with their father and can't be found, Noriko goes to a neighbor whose widowed son and small daughter live with her. The son, Kenkichi, goes with Noriko to help her find the boys off-screen. Kenkichi is a doctor and is later offered a promotion from his boss, Koichi, at a provincial hospital. Noriko takes a farewell gift to his house and before she leaves, she and Kenkichi's mother have arranged for her and Kenkichi to be married without his or her parents' knowledge or permission! How terribly forward and untraditional! Kenkichi is delighted, her parents not so much. "She acts like she grew up all by herself." Even though the family knows and respects Kenkichi, he's not wealthy and worst of all, he already has a child. Noriko loves the little girl and can't understand what the problem is.

The father goes to the store and has to wait for a train to pass by. Just like his teapot, trains play a big part in most of Ozu's films. Subconsciously, we know that trains are either taking people to somewhere or away from somewhere. Here the movement within the family is spurred by Noriko making a decision for herself, she's not only moving physically away from her family, but also away from the family's sphere of influence. The father realizes his family is transforming and that the train will soon be taking his daughter away as much as he would love for his family to stay together.

Always hesitant to show much romance, Ozu finally lets Noriko give voice to why she made what looked like a rash decision.
She admits her long standing feelings for Kenkichi. He's someone she trusts and knows she will be happy with. Her best friend reveals to Noriko that what she's talking about is love. Noriko doesn't always come across as the sharpest knife in the drawer with her perma-smile and sunny disposition, but even she knew that marrying a man who had been resolutely a bachelor until forty might make for a difficult relationship no matter how much money he had. Better to clip coupons and work on a blended family as a stepmother with someone she cares for than to be on unequal footing with an older stranger.

"It's like when you look for something all over the place, and you find it was right in front of you all along."

The acting in this film was uneven for me. It was interesting seeing Ozu regular Ryu as the older brother with jet black hair. Two years after this film, he would play an elderly father role with the actress who played the mother in this film in Tokyo Story. In Tokyo Twilight he played Hara's father! I have a love-hate relationship with Hara Setsuko. When she's given the chance to show a range of emotions, I find her compelling. I have a more difficult time when no matter what happens on screen, whether she's been offered congratulations or told she has six months to live she responds with the same smiling face. It can feel like a mask hiding the character's true emotions and I would like to see the depth of the character played out more.

Single, childless Ozu has more than once had two young brothers in his films, Good Morning and I Was Born…But, come to mind. In the films I've seen thus far, and also in this one, the boys are very disrespectful, selfish, and throw fits on a regular basis. Maybe it's because the kids always seem cooped up in the house like the caged birds in this film that they go stir crazy. More than likely, it's how someone who is childless sees children, but I find the children in his films can cross the line from delightfully realistic to incredibly annoying. There was a some of both in this film.

Unlike some of Ozu's older films where tradition must be maintained in the family and with fear of modern influences damaging the familial structure, Noriko is not punished for making her own decision regarding her future. No train runs her down nor is there a disaster to her reputation. I found this different direction with more sympathy toward the young people by the director a breath of fresh air.

Just like the sunny, carefree days of summer seem as if they will last forever, we know fall is around the corner. It doesn't mean the end of the world but it is a time of transition, even as Noriko's family had to accept that change is inevitable. Life is always in flux and families have to be flexible. Much like the family portrait taken in the film with the parents and their children and grandchildren, the last photo is only of the parents. In time, most parents will see their children move out to make lives of their own and be left by themselves with a much quieter house.

After Noriko is wed, again off-screen, and her brother and his family have moved due to his job, her parents talk about their lives. The father laments, "I wish we could live together forever, but that's impossible." On reflection they realize that they have lived a good life and raised their children well. They have earned their, if not happy, at least pleasant and contented ending.

2/23/23