“Living alone like this, the days will get very long.”

Yasujiro Ozu’s Tokyo Story tells the simple tale of a nearly two-week-long trip that aging couple Tomi and Shukichi take to the titular city to spend time with their children, children-in-law, and grandchildren. Their journey is marred by disappointment, and ends with unexpected tragedy.

The movie has an understated but raw emotional power, which does not come from a complicated narrative, flashy set-pieces, or heightened drama. It sneaks up on you with a compassionate portrayal of intergenerational family dynamics and the restrained, elegant way in which the filmmaking lets us into their world.

Near the beginning of the film, Shige, the eldest daughter of Tomi, makes a joke at her mother’s expense in front of Tomi and Noriko, Shige’s sister-in-law. Not one to be bothered by the banter, Tomi responds with wit. All three women leave the room laughing. The scene ostensibly ends.

But it doesn’t. Before cutting to the next scene, Ozu lingers on the room, now empty. He then cuts to a shot of a separate, silent, empty hallway. The contrast between this moment of human connection and the emptiness that follows it is a jarring reminder of the warmth that is absent when the people we love are no longer filling our spaces.

Before anything disappointing, tragic, or profound happens to the characters, the filmmaking forces us to pause and reflect on this moment, which later becomes a theme.

By the end of Tokyo Story, the family at its center will learn that lesson along with all of the baggage that comes with not appreciating who you have until they are gone, and of the regret that we face when we fail to see beyond our own responsibilities and take care of the emotional needs of the most important people in our lives.

Tokyo Story doesn’t force its hand when communicating this theme. Its characters are good, caring people — as much as any of us are — whose preoccupation with work, bills, and other responsibilities distract them from what really matters. There are no forced redemption arcs or malicious motivations to be explored here. The movie simply portrays people as they are, with their often immovable hang-ups and flaws.

Take another early scene, which introduces the dynamic between Noriko and her parents-in-law. They have a warm, loving rapport, strengthened by shared loss: Noriko’s former husband was killed eight years prior during World War II. But they dance around the emotions related to this tragedy in conversation, never truly connecting beyond surface-level chatter.

“Are you still working for the same company?” “Yes,” Noriko shyly says, without any elaboration. Not sure how to ask follow-up questions, but wanting to connect, Tomi introduces a subject change that carries emotional weight for them all: “It must be hard to be on your own.” Noriko affirms that it is, but laughs it off, feeling as if it would be too impolite to dive into that conversation. Shukichi is then told that a bath is ready for him, and he leaves the room to unwind after his long travels instead of hanging around to talk.

Not long after, Tomi joins her young grandson outside as he plays in the yard. She asks him, “What are you going to be when you grow up?” He doesn’t answer. “A doctor like your father?” she wonders. “By the time you become a doctor, I wonder if I’ll still be here.” He doesn’t reply, but plays, wrapped up in his own imaginative world. Their unique perceptions of the weight — or lack thereof — of the moment correspond to what they have going on in their individual lives. The music and performances make it a fairly melodramatic scene, but it nevertheless distills the heart of this story in just a minute of screen time, with a series of back-and-forth medium shots and a few simple lines of dialogue.

The dialogue in most movies is dramatized for both entertainment value and contextual clarity. But here, the words left unsaid are the ones that speak the clearest. The adult children, with children and professional obligations of their own, view entertaining and housing their parents as a burden. The parents know this and feel guilty about imposing, but they want to see their children, who moved so very far away and live such different lives than they once knew. No one will admit as much, but the children all try to pawn off the responsibility of taking care of their parents on one another.

“I just hope that we’re not inconveniencing you,” Shukichi says to Fumiko, another daughter-in-law, who in the scene prior had gotten into a lengthy argument with her own son about having to move his studying desk to another room because she needed to make space for Shukichi and Tomi’s arrival. Fumiko pauses, then abruptly changes the subject. Here, as in so many instances throughout the film, the silence speaks louder than the words.

From start to finish, Tokyo Story is a showcase of deceptively simple filmmaking. Those used to American movies — or even the films of some of Ozu’s more famous Japanese contemporaries, like Akira Kurosawa — could be forgiven for craving close-ups, over-the-shoulder shots, camera movement, and all of the other typical cinematic techniques that are often used to draw viewers into the emotions of the story.

But that desire would be missing the point of the stylistic choices here. Themes are communicated as much in the lack of camera movement and through the character blocking within each frame as they are in what is said and omitted in the stop-and-start conversational pleasantries of the film’s dialogue.

Many scenes are framed-within-the-frame within doorways, with the viewer one step removed from the scene — involved, but detached. The elderly parents sit still, often in the center of the frame, as their family members and others quickly enter and exit each scene.

Tomi and Shukichi sit idle as their world moves around and away from them. We sit idle with them.

Tomi and Shukichi love their children, but are disappointed by them. They arrive at their son’s house expecting him to be a big-shot city doctor. They discover that he is, in reality, a clinician at a small facility in the suburbs. So why did he have to move so far away? And when they visit him, he doesn’t prioritize them — as they arrive, he immediately leaves. A sick child at the clinic needs his care and attention.

Then, when the parents visit their eldest daughter, she doesn’t want to spend any money entertaining them and is too busy running her own beauty shop business… so the duty to entertain ultimately falls on Noriko, who takes the day off of work to escort her parents-in-law on a bus tour of Tokyo. We don’t see the city, but instead get a look at their faces as the bus bounces down the urban streets. Tomi and Shukichi appreciate the gesture but look like they’d rather be somewhere else.

After the tour, Tomi and Shukichi spend time with Noriko in her modest apartment. After a little sake, they ask if their son gave her any trouble while he was alive, given that he was a drinker. She laughs, but her expression communicates the truth — he did. She uncomfortably stands up to fetch them all more sake while she changes the subject of the conversation.

The blocking shifts with each turn in the dialogue.

The story unfolds as a chain of missed connections and disappointments, until the parents decide that it is time for them to go home. As they return to Tokyo from the spa to spend one more night with their children, they are faced with the biggest disappointment of all: they have nowhere to stay. Noriko makes room for Tomi. But Shukichi must fend for himself, and without support from his family, he slides back out of his years-long sobriety as he turns to an old friend for company and shelter.

Tomi has a more positive night. Alone with Noriko, Tomi starts to unpack their shared feelings for the first time about the death of Noriko’s husband, and about Noriko’s future plans. Near the end of the film, we are told that Tomi’s favorite memory of their trip to Tokyo was that conversation. All that both parents wanted was a little connection.

After World War II and the subsequent American occupation, Japan began to adopt more traditionally “western” capitalistic and individualistic ideals in their society. It helped their country rebuild in the face of devastation, but at a cultural cost. To this day, Japan has a productivity-obsessed culture that overworks its population and leaves little time for those traditional values.

Tokyo Story beautifully contends with this societal shift. None of the characters are bad people. They just have things to do, and bills to pay, and money is tight, and life is stressful, and they take for granted that there will always be more time.

Tomi dies suddenly after her trip to Tokyo. The family travels to their hometown for the funeral. But most leave within a day or two to return to their own lives, leaving Shukichi alone to mourn.

He is calm, caring, and understanding when his children tell him that they need to leave. He tries to find beauty in the small things, like a sunrise over the bay. But it becomes clear that without the direct support of his family, Shukichi will have difficulty navigating his sorrow and dealing with negative emotions. It is hinted that he will turn to alcohol to cope.

Shukichi becomes, in these final scenes, a harrowing reminder of the fragility of our happiness, and the importance of checking in regularly with the people you love.

For a moment as we begin to process this heavy resolution, there is a final glimmer of hope. As Shukichi sits alone with his thoughts, a neighbor check in on him to see how he’s doing after the funeral. He is unusually honest about his emotions: “If I knew things would come to this, I’d have been kinder to her. Living alone like this, the days will get very long.” The neighbor acknowledges that this is true. But as quickly as she arrived, she leaves. She has places to go, people to see, bills of her own to pay. And Shukichi is left alone to reflect on all that he has lost, and all that his future will and will not be.

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I watched Tokyo Story for the first time during the COVID-19 pandemic. At a time in which we are all isolated in our homes, away from the ones we love, this movie resonated powerfully. Though it was released almost 70 years ago, Tokyo Story is still a poignant reminder that it is essential that we slow down and appreciate the people we love. Because some day, possibly abruptly, they won’t be here anymore.