24
Jun/16

NEW YORK ASIAN FILM FESTIVAL: WHAT A WONDERFUL FAMILY!

24
Jun/16
WHAT A WONDERFUL FAMILY!

All Tomiko (Kazuko Yoshiyuki) wants for her birthday is a divorce from her husband, Shuzo (Isao Hashizume), in WHAT A WONDERFUL FAMILY!

WHAT A WONDERFUL FAMILY! (家族はつらいよ) (Yoji Yamada, 2016)
Film Society of Lincoln Center, Walter Reade Theater
165 West 65th St. between Eighth Ave. & Broadway
Sunday, June 26, 12 noon
Festival runs June 22 – July 9
212-875-5050
www.filmlinc.org
www.subwaycinema.com

For her birthday this year, Tomiko Hirata (Kazuko Yoshiyuki) wants something simple from her stubborn, not-very-thoughtful husband of fifty years, Shuzo (Isao Hashizume): a divorce. That shocking wish sends the entire Hirata clan into a frenzy in Yoji Yamada’s charmingly bittersweet What a Wonderful Family! The retired Shuzo doesn’t know what he’ll do without Tomiko, but he is not the kind of man to share his feelings; instead, he prefers to go to a local watering hole and flirt with the cute bartender, play golf, or take the dog, Toto, to the park. Their daughter, Shigeko (Tomoko Nakajima), is mad at her husband, Taizo Kanai (Shozo Hayashiya), for stretching the truth about one of his hobbies. Eldest son Konosuke (Masahiko Nishimura) tends not to get involved, even as his wife, Fumie (Yui Natsukawa), essentially runs the household and their children, Kenichi (Takanosuke Nakamura) and Nobusuke (Ayumu Maruyama), just run around. And youngest son Shota (Satoshi Tsumabuki) has a promising future that just might include his new girlfriend, Noriko Mamiya (Yu Aoi), although all of the divorce talk suddenly has him thinking twice.

WHAT A WONDERFUL FAMILY!

The Hirata family face some troubling times in bittersweet Yoji Yamada comedy

Yamada (the long-running Tora-san series, Twilight Samurai), who is now eighty-five years old, cowrote the playfully goofy script with Emiko Hiramatsu, not letting things get too serious or depressing. Except for a few sappy moments, Studio Ghibli veteran Joe Hisaishi’s soundtrack is effective in maintaining the generally lighthearted mood, and cinematographer Masashi Chikamori maintains a sharp, bright look to the film. What a Wonderful Family! evokes the legacy of legendary Japanese auteur Yasujirō Ozu; in fact, at one point Shuzo is watching Ozu’s Tokyo Story on television. In another scene, a writing teacher, Takamura (Katsumi Kiba), describes revered Japanese author Natsume Sōseki’s Kokoro as “a beautiful recounting of sweet, sad, and regretful youthful memories”; you wouldn’t be too far off base saying the same thing about What a Wonderful Family!, which is screening June 26 at 12 noon at the Walter Reade Theater as part of the New York Asian Film Festival, which runs through July 9 at the Film Society of Lincoln Center and the SVA Theatre and includes more than fifty diverse works from Japan, China, Taiwan, Vietnam, South Korea, Hong Kong, Thailand, Malaysia, and the Philippines.