Japanese films - Ochazuke no aji

Men at home

What is more interesting, watching bike races or playing pachinko?

Women on a trip

The women can enjoy their trip because they lied to their husbands.

Movie Data

Title: The taste of green tea over rice
Original title: お茶漬の味 Ochazuke no Aji
Published: 1952
Length: 115 minutes

Staff
Director: Yasujirō Ozu
Script: Kōgo Noda, Yasujirō Ozu
Music: Ichirō Saitō

Cast
Shin Saburi : Mokichi Satake
Michiyo Kogure: Taeko Satake
Kōji Tsuruta: Non-chan / Noboru Okada
Ryū Chishū: Sadao Hirayama
Chikage Awashima: Aya Amamiya
Keiko Tsushima: Setsuko Yamauchi
Kuniko Miyake: Chizu Yamauchi
Eijirō Yanagi: Naosuke Yamauchi

Story

Taeko and Mokichi Satake are a childless couple living in Tokyo. As a department manager in a company, he is responsible for technical products, while she does not have to work.
The film offers an interesting insight into Japan in the early 1950s. It is about the topic of arranged marriages and what then becomes of them in everyday life. The film shows the emotional state of the people involved in calm and sensitive images.
When Taeko and Mokichi talk openly to each other, they also find a solution how they can live well together.

An einem Tag im Frühling 1929

The song that the women sing in a cheerful group, "Sumire no hana saku koro", is the Japanese version of "On a Day in Spring". The song was composed in 1929 by Franz Doelle (1883-1965) and made popular by the 1933 German film "Viktor und Viktoria", where ist was sung by Renate Müller. The story has been remade several times in other languages, as for example as "George et Georgette" in French. The best-known version is the one from 1982 with Julie Andrews.
The Japanese text was written by Tetsuzo Shirai (1900-1983), the famous director of the Takarazuka Revue. Through the shows of the Takarzuka Revue the song became very popular in Japan.