No Regrets for Our Youth

Definitely a movie of its time. Does require one to have a more than average understanding of Japanese society during those years leading up to the war to get the full emotional kick. There are layers in Setsuko Hara's reactions that's strong and narrates us effectively through her experiences. The key driving force for me.

This movie is at times a bit of a slog, but the points made are worthy of a review. Considering it was just one year after the war was over, this was an important movie to make to help explain the heroism and sacrifice of this one man and woman as an example of the many who did the same. It also reveals how difficult it was to reject the prevailing trends of the day. Educational freedom seems a given in modern life, but it was not always so. Worth watching but not entirely satisfying.

Solid film, with a few distinctive flourishes from Kurosawa. Also some more poetic sequences, light and airy early on, shifting to a chastened optimism later in the film. Very enjoyable overall.

Hara is absolutely marvelous, but the film itself is great too. The techniques are clearly influenced by Eisenstein and Dovzhenko, in fact the whole thing closely resembles a Soviet propagnda film, in style and content. Indeed, it also carries that same bluntness, which is its greatest drawback. It could also be said that Kurosawa doesn't capture women particularly well (this was his ONLY movie with a female protagonist), but I guess not everyone can have Mizoguchi's talent in that area.

Feels like Kurosawa's first real masterpiece. The filmmaking aspects are stunning and Setsuko Hara's performance is incredible, but the guts it took to release a story so heavily critical of the fascist Japanese government only a year after WW2 is what impressed me. I learned so much from this movie which prompted me to research more about the people and historic events that inspired it.

Kurosawa channeling the Soviets of course it’s gonna be up my alley.

Semana em honra do centenário de Setsuko Hara filme #5. Kurosawa full antifa. Temos Setsuko com fogo nas ventas, o que difere bastante de sua persona sob a batuta de Ozu, é quase um sopro perfumado vê-la tão intempestiva e impulsiva e talvez nunca esteve tão bonit quanto aqui. Há momentos cinema soviético, como a montagem logo no início mescando recorte de jornais e a revolta dos estudantes, assim como as mulheres lavrando a terra mais para o final. Box Versátil O Cinema de Kurosawa 1.

86.00

Not that interesting. I was put of by the story. The character of Yukie felt alien to me, with reactions that were unpredictable, which didn't help because of her lack of dialogue. There are segments where Kurosawa works his magic, but I found them few and far between.

Kurosawa's first postwar film is a domestic epic, describing the final decade of Imperial Japan through the life of Yukie Yagihara, the daughter of a leftist university professor. Setsuko Hara provides a wonderful performance, as always, elevating an otherwise blandly written central character and powering us through when the film starts to drag in the third act. Overall, it's well crafted but a bit too blunt (one might say bludgeoning) in its message of freedom overcoming an oppressive regime.

86.000

68.750

Could have easily lost a good block of it's third act sections, when Hara moves to the country again; the propaganda bits are just too pronounced. Kurosawa and Hara are enough to make my reaction favorable, though. There are some inspired stylistic choices he went with here, a fair amount that I haven't seen duplicated in later work.

I found this film excrutiatingly boring. The only Kurosawa I didn't love.

Viewing this film again some 15 years later, it's apparent how underappreciated this is as perhaps Kurosawa's first masterpiece. A reflection of national resurgence, not exempt from propaganda, but importantly reactionary to Kurosawa's own previous assignment work for the war effort. The textures resemble both Soviet rhythms and French idylls. Setsuko Hara's presence here alone is enough to justify her as a feminist icon. This film deserves so much more, like a proper restoration to begin with.

No Regrets For Our Youth drags for a bit in the second act, but it fits the story and never becomes boring. Setsuko Hara is fantastic, if a little modest of a protagonist, and Kurosawa's style begins to formulate on screen (note the rain scenes). This is not to be missed, and fits in well with other second-tier Akira Kurosawa films (which is still better than some directors' magna opera).