Watch this when
Tokyo Story
Their children loved them. They were just busy. That's the whole tragedy, and it's the most ordinary one there is.
Who it's for
Nothing dramatic happens in Tokyo Story: an elderly couple visits their grown children, who are kind enough but too busy, and it quietly shows how that ordinary neglect feels from both sides.
Feelings it meets
What it is
Yasujirō Ozu's 1953 drama follows Shūkichi and Tomi Hirayama, a retired couple from Onomichi, who travel to Tokyo to visit their grown children. Their eldest son Kōichi, a doctor, and eldest daughter Shige, who runs a hair salon, are too busy to spend much time with them and send them off to a hot spring resort at Atami, while their widowed daughter-in-law Noriko makes time to show them the city.
Where to find it
Rent or buy on major digital stores. Streaming availability rotates; check JustWatch.
Before you start
Heads up: Death of a parent and grief.
Age: Not rated in US (suggested 10+)
To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.Alfred, Lord Tennyson, “Ulysses”
