Busan is good

Homage to Yasujiro Ozu

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Homage to Yasujiro Ozu
Cinematheque Busan
From May 8 through May 23

Discovered outside of Japan much later than Kenji Mizoguchi or Akira Kurosawa, Yasujiro Ozu (1903-1963) is considered one of the most respected filmmakers from the mid-20th century. In a recent poll of international film critics by Sight and Sound magazine, Ozu was named one of the ten best directors of all time, and his ``Tokyo Story'' (1953) was voted one of the top five films. His mature works from the 1950s and '60s almost always focus on the subject of family. Ozu took on the basic struggles we face in life _ birth and death, childhood and adulthood and tradition and modernity _ and created ``one of the most profound visions of family life in the history of cinema,'' according to the Web site Sense of Cinema. The Cinematheque Busan retrospective, which comprises 17 films with both English and Korean subtitles, is part of a series of screenings held throughout the world last year and this year in celebration of the 100th anniversary of the director's birth, and will travel to Seoul on May 28. Details: (051) 742-5377, ext. 3, www.piff.org/cinema (in Korean).