![a young Japanese man and woman sit next to one another at a bar looking at the vieweralr](/public/upload/events/medium/644aac1a7b405.jpg?1682615322)
What Did the Lady Forget? is a special title in Ozu’s filmography because it sets out to be a comedy of manners, depicting the lives of the wealthy with a more satirical bent. The film’s bourgeois characters—not Ozu’s first, but his most opulent—are surrounded by reminders of their wealth: golf clubs, cakes, English homework, shopping bags. Chain-smoking, hard-drinking Setsuko (Kuwano Michiko) visits her rich uncle Komiya (Saito Tatsuo), whose socialite wife Tokiko (Kurishima Sumiko) loathes Setsuko’s newfangled ways. Komiya and Setsuko bond over a mutual resentment of Tokiko, but between them there is a surprising difference: Setsuko argues that Komiya must put his wife in her place—advice that belies her self-styling as a modern woman, and which makes the film’s title even more mystifying. Because the characters’ petty disagreements revolve around how to best spend one’s free time—for instance, whether to golf or go to a Ginza bar—the film implicitly invokes Ozu’s blue-collar characters who cannot afford such luxuries. Though Ozu does not exactly skewer the rich, he cleverly underscores the ideological contradictions and compromises that hold their identities in place.
Part of film series
Screenings from this program
Late Spring
![two women in traditional Japanese dress sitting on a mat indoors, looking at the camera](/public/upload/events/thumb_wide/64498b123f5ee.jpg?1682541335)
Tokyo Story
![Two young Japanese women in shirts and skirts sit on stools on the street, slightly smiling and looking at the viewer](/public/upload/events/thumb_wide/64498be38e74d.jpg?1684418221)
Early Summer
![Medium wide shot, down a short hallway, of two women in the kitchen, one cutting a cake and smiling](/public/upload/events/thumb_wide/64498eb3188e1.jpg?1682542260)
Passing Fancy
![A woman in traditional Japanese dress and a man with a beret, sitting next to each other looking despondent](/public/upload/events/thumb/64498fca874a9.jpg?1682542665)
Dragnet Girl
![close-up of a woman behind a man with a fedora, she has one hand on his shoulder and the other points a gun](/public/upload/events/thumb/6449919b6b80e.jpg?1682543009)
Tokyo Story
![Two young Japanese women in shirts and skirts sit on stools on the street, slightly smiling and looking at the viewer](/public/upload/events/thumb_wide/64498be38e74d.jpg?1684418221)
A Story of Floating Weeds
![two women in traditional Japanese dress stand next to each other, bodies facing sideways and turned toward the camera, one with a cigarette hanging out of her mouth](/public/upload/events/thumb/644992ee61b42.jpg?1682543347)
Days of Youth
![a line of youth and adults smiling at the ski slopes](/public/upload/events/thumb/64499461ecdcf.jpg?1682543716)
The Flavor of Green Tea over Rice
![a group of women wearing the same graphically printed traditional Japanese dress](/public/upload/events/thumb_wide/644997b24a06e.jpg?1682544564)
Early Spring
![a group of young Japanese men and women at dinner gaze at one man and a woman shaking hands over the table](/public/upload/events/thumb_wide/644a8498d959e.jpg?1682605211)
The Munekata Sisters
![man in a suit sitting on the stairs of a Japanese temple with his head turned toward the woman next to him in traditional Japanese dress, speaking](/public/upload/events/thumb_wide/644a7e92a919a.jpg?1682603668)
Floating Weeds
![a Japanese man and woman in traditional dress look past the camera with concerned expressions](/public/upload/events/thumb_wide/644a8c8b0d2de.jpg?1682607503)
Good Morning
![two young Japanese boys sit sideways at a desk in a bedroom turned toward and looking at the viewer](/public/upload/events/thumb_wide/644a8f48c5854.jpg?1682607947)
Late Autumn
![three Japanese women seated on mats with tea, one wearing traditional dress](/public/upload/events/thumb_wide/644a9b3c3097b.jpg?1682611255)
Tokyo Twilight
![a Japanese woman sits facing the viewer, resting her head on her hand which holds a cigarette](/public/upload/events/thumb_wide/644aa2d603d3a.jpg?1682612952)
The Brothers and Sisters of the Toda Family
![close-up of a young Japanese woman resting her head on the shoulder of a young Japanese man](/public/upload/events/thumb_wide/644aa47598b4f.jpg?1682613369)
I Flunked, But …
![](/public/upload/events/thumb/644aa6c91b129.jpg?1682613964)
Late Autumn
![three Japanese women seated on mats with tea, one wearing traditional dress](/public/upload/events/thumb_wide/644a9b3c3097b.jpg?1682611255)
Where Now Are the Dreams of Youth?
![a young man with a military cap leans on the counter of a bar looking at another man in military garb looking down while a woman stands behind the bar, between them](/public/upload/events/thumb/644aacbc8fcd5.jpg?1682615487)
The End of Summer
![a young woman in Western-style dress and an older woman in traditional Japanese dress lean on a porch railing, smiling and looking out](/public/upload/events/thumb_wide/644aaddad5717.jpg?1682615778)
Early Spring
![a group of young Japanese men and women at dinner gaze at one man and a woman shaking hands over the table](/public/upload/events/thumb_wide/644a8498d959e.jpg?1682605211)
Café Lumière
![a seated woman stares off in the distance and in the middle ground a man seated at a table with tea looks off while a young woman in the distance sits next to a window drinking tea](/public/upload/events/thumb_wide/644ab0de6a043.jpg?1682616544)
Tokyo Story
![Two young Japanese women in shirts and skirts sit on stools on the street, slightly smiling and looking at the viewer](/public/upload/events/thumb_wide/64498be38e74d.jpg?1684418221)