Depicts the life of a family in a remote Japanese timber village. Family head Tahara Kozo lives with his mother Sachiko, wife Yasuyo, nephew Eisuke and young daughter Michiru. Economic recession and failed development plans cause tragedy in the family.
I interpret this film as a slow, meditative thesis on the wabi-sabi of generational change. Like the fleeting cherry blossoms, the Japanese have reverence and respect for impermanence and imperfection. In the middle of the film, we heard an older man ask "How will our young find someone to marry (if the railroad is not built)?" Everyone is aware of the traditional village dissolving, yet only Kozo is unable to live with this. He disappears. Yasuyo moves away taking Machiko with her. Eisuke, who was, and still is, afraid of the ghosts in the tunnel (the past?) decides to remain in the village, perhaps only because the tradition of living with family still resides in him. We in the Western world do not seem to appreciate the trajectory of change in our own culture. Even viewed through the lens of our contemporary ADD, this film is good.