Setsuko Hara
One of postwar Japan’s most beloved yet mysterious cinema stars, Setsuko Hara was an actor extraordinaire. A muse to revered golden-age director Yasujurô Ozu, she was known for far more than just her spellbinding grace and beauty: she represented modernity while still embodying Japanese tradition, and acted with exquisite depth and emotion, her faultless performances moving even the most hardened of critics.
In the wake of Hara’s passing late last year, MIFF presents this special retrospective program featuring some of her greatest work: from her first film with Ozu, 1949’s Late Spring, to their crowning masterwork, Tokyo Story – the 1953 film that toppled Citizen Kane as the best film ever made in the Sight & Sound poll of global directors – to her remarkable turns with other legendary directors Akira Kurosawa, Mikio Naruse and Yoshimura Kimisaburo.
Prints of No Regrets for Our Youth, Sound of the Mountain and A Ball at the Anjo House courtesy of The Japan Foundation.
