ozu-screenplay-style

Ozu Screenplay Style (小津安二郎剧本写法)

Output language = language of the question; terms are always anchored back to the original words, see sw-workflow/terms.md, do not invent translated names.

This skill is distilled from a scene-by-scene breakdown of the six screenplays in 《小津安二郎剧本集》 (screenplays by Noda Kogo + Ozu Yasujiro, translated by Wu Fei): 《晚春》 (1949, 103 scenes), 《麦秋》 (1951, 145 scenes), 《东京物语》 (1953, 176 scenes), 《浮草》 (1959, 121 scenes), 《秋日和》 (1960, 110 scenes), 《秋刀鱼之味》 (1962, 98 scenes).

Core creed:All major events happen off-screen; the screenplay writes only the domestic everyday before and after the event. What the audience sees is not the event, but the ripples the event stirs in human relationships.

The scene-by-scene structural tables and original-text examples for each screenplay are in the same directory reference.md。

0. Medium boundaries: which layers can be carried over, and which cannot

This is a set ofJapanese filmmethods; the format section isJapanese screenplay format. Choose by layer:

Layer	Can it be carried over
Structural skeleton and the three templates of marrying off a daughter / bereavement / secret	Yes, this is the main value of this skill
The fifteen writing rules(events off-screen, minimal-syllable acknowledgment, intermediary relays messages, echo object escalates three times, supporting characters speak for the protagonist, diminishing ending)	Yes, directly usable for film and series. Two carry capacity preconditions; read before carrying into a series: II-1 (events off-screen) and II-14 (one monologue)
Dialogue writing(honorific-level gaps, repeated greetings, no explanation)	Yes
Format specifications (Section 8)	No. That is Japanese-style slugline・ト書き format (`○地点（时间）`, ト書き indented three spaces,`人物名「台词」`). For a Chinese draft use the scene-number system; for Hollywood style use Fountain, see `sw-format-adaptation` II-2
Scene length 1–1.5 pages	Caution. It is built on Ozu's rhythm and Japanese page layout; for a Chinese draft recalculate according to the conversion chain in `sw-format-adaptation` , do not directly apply the page count

Carry over the templates and writing rules, not the format and page count.

1. The shared skeleton of the six: one member of the family leaves

Title	Core event	Driver	Lie/scheme	Absent object	Closing empty shot
Late Spring	Father marries off daughter	Aunt	Father lies about remarrying	The arranged-match prospect Satake	Apple peel breaks → night sea
Early Summer	Family marries off daughter	Director + whole family	None (daughter decides for herself)	The suitor Manabe (face unclear in the photo)	Barley field + another family's wedding procession
Tokyo Story	Parents visit child → mother dies	None (time)	None	—	Empty platform at dawn → motorboat recedes
Floating Weeds	Father sees illegitimate child	Mistress	"Uncle" identity; bribed to seduce	—	Night train
Late Autumn	Mother marries off daughter	Three old classmates	Friends fabricate a "remarriage" for the mother; whether the mother "doesn't want to remarry" is true or false is indistinguishable	Goto (appears but functions weakly)	Folding a haori → empty corridor
An Autumn Afternoon	Father marries off daughter	Old classmates + mirror characters	Two pranks (fake death, fake matchmaking meeting)	Prospective match ("very tall")	Dressing mirror in the dark

Four are "marrying off a daughter," one is "losing a wife," one is "acknowledging a child."The true event is always "a member of the family leaves", and what the script writes is the everyday life before the departure and the emptiness after it.

To write an Ozu-style script, first answer three questions:

Who is leaving this home? (the leaver)
Who is left behind? (the one left behind = protagonist)
Who is pushing this to happen? (the pusher — usually has selfish motives)

II. Fifteen cross-film recurring writing methods (ordered by reusability)

1. Events offscreen, reactions onscreen

Weddings, matchmaking meetings, deaths, proposals, and confessions are never written. Late Spring scene 74 is directly "it's already been a week since the matchmaking meeting"; the wedding is written only as a single line before the mirror before going out, "Father...", and after the return, the bar and the empty room.
The mother's death in Tokyo Story: scene 143 the father keeps vigil → scene 144 "Dawn: an empty platform — a street with no pedestrians — small waves lapping the stone wall of the coast" → scene 145 "Fumiko's face is covered with a white cloth." It does not write the last breath, nor wailing.
Early Summer has no proposal scene at all; the man Noriko agrees to is Kenkichi's mother, and Kenkichi himself comes home drunk and, told "she's willing to come," only says "Come where—" "Come to do what—"
Instruction: list the three biggest events in the script, move them all out of the picture, and write only the scene before and the scene after each event. The events themselves are carried by a set of unpeopled landscape scenes.
Capacity precondition: this method requires the number of scenes within the carrying unit ≥100(Ozu's six films have 103–176 scenes), so that there is room for the blank space to unfold. A series with 25–35 scenes per episode cannot sustain an entire episode offscreen — it can onlybe used locally: choose one event in the whole series to move offscreen, give one scene before and one after, and write the remaining events onscreen as usual; to use it for a whole stretch, enlarge the carrying unit to a **season or movement** rather than a single episode.

2. Lie-type propulsion

In Late Spring the father falsely claims to be remarrying → the daughter marries; the father never admits the fabrication to the daughter within the play, and the truth is revealed by another person (Aya) at the end: "I couldn't tell such a beautiful lie."
In Late Autumn three old classmates fabricate a "remarriage" for the mother → the daughter accuses the mother, who knows nothing about it, of being "dirty" → on the final night the mother says, "Mother still wants to be alone... Don't think that Mother lied in order to marry you off" — it can be read either as a lie or as sincere feeling, and the character herself denies that it was a lie.
Floating Weeds: the identity lie of the "uncle"; Sumiko spends one thousand yen to buy Kayo to seduce Akira.
An Autumn Afternoon: two pranks (Kawai makes up that Horie "died"; Horie makes up that "the matchmaking meeting was yesterday") rehearse the protagonist's worst fears, and both are joked about by those closest to him.
Instruction: have the instigator tell a well-meaning lie; the truth is exposed by a bystander, or never exposed; write the parent's final statement so that truth and falsehood cannot be separated.

3. Minimal-syllable acknowledgment

Late Spring, scene 71: three "mm"s complete the entire turn (see reference example A): "Will you remarry?" "Mm..." "You will remarry, won't you?" "Mm." "The person from today?" "Mm."
Early Summer, scene 119, family meeting: "Surely you won't?" "I won't." "Really won't?" "..." "Surely you won't?" "I won't." Then the parents: "Hmm... hmm... hmm... let's sleep..."
Instruction: the key acknowledgment or refusal uses only one syllable, and the other party asks three times in a row; write the silence "..." as a full line of dialogue.

4. The intermediary relays words

The aunt relays words up and down the stairs, and Noriko's "mm" is translated by the aunt into "She says she's willing to marry!" (Late Spring 77–80); Koichi hides behind the paper door and pokes his head out three times to direct his sister-in-law to "ask a little more cleverly" (Early Summer 61); Shige makes a phone call and "outsources" the parents to Noriko (Tokyo Story 58); the trio sit around a table to discuss (Early Autumn); the father sends his son to ask Miura (An Autumn Afternoon 64–71).
Instruction: there is always a person between the protagonist and the object; the instructions of the authority figure must pass through an intermediary, and this relay itself is comedy.

5. The object who never appears

Sakata has only three teasing descriptions: "like Gary Cooper / like a meter reader / like Kumataro"; Manabe has only a golf photo in which "his face is completely unrecognizable," a who's who entry, and hearsay; Okazaki's second son is only "very tall."
Instruction: the object who is chosen or rejected is not given a face, only three descriptions from others. The audience does not need to know whom the protagonist rejected—the wrong option is only an information set.

6. Empty-shot scene divisions

Between every emotional segment there must be a 1–2 line scenery scene: "The sunlight lingers—a bush warbler calls"; empty theater seats → Noriko walking alone in Marunouchi (Late Spring 40–42); carp streamers; a balloon with a broken string; a wheat field; the night sea; a train.
Instruction: write transitional empty shots as independent scene numbers, one line of description, with no emotional adjectives and no explanation.

7. Echoing objects and catchphrases

"Dirty" (Late Spring 25→26→85→88→90, five times: from joke to guilt); "pickled radish with threads still attached" twice, with the meaning reversed the second time; the pipe (Early Autumn four times: Akiko gives it to Mamiya → Ayako delivers it to the director's office → Taguchi also gets one → at the end Hirayama says, "You're all lucky—you all got pipes"); the warship march (An Autumn Afternoon three times: Sakamoto salutes and circles → Hirayama politely declines → on the wedding night he listens on his own initiative, and the drunk guest says "we lost the war" → at the end he hums it alone); "blessed" (Tokyo Story three times: the neighbor wife's envy → Numata's irony → the old couple's self-consolation, devalued each time); "putting a quilt over the grave" (Keizo first says it as a joke, later says it in remorse); matches (Floating Weeds, two struck at the end).
Instruction: choose a small object or phrase and arrange for it to appear 3 times, with each context advancing the meaning by one step (joke → hurt → reconciliation, or envy → irony → self-mockery). The belongings of the dead may circulate among the supporting characters, and at the end count "who did not get one."

8. Supporting characters speak for the protagonist

In *Tokyo Story*, the old people themselves never complain: Minoru rages that his desk has been moved away, Kyoko says "They're too selfish," and Numata says "They treat me as a burden"; the old man's heaviest comment on his own situation is spoken with a smile: "So in the end I've become homeless."
In *Early Autumn*, Yuriko bursts into the director's office and puts the three old men on trial: "Why throw stones into a calm pond and stir up trouble?"
In *An Autumn Afternoon*, the daughter turns it back on him: "Father, don't you think so too? You'd rather I just stayed here like this..." The father can only answer, "It's not like that."
Instruction: the protagonist's grievances are spoken by the lowest-status character; the questioning of authority is given to the youngest outsider, and immediately after the questioning it turns to comedy (drunkenness/sushi shop); the protagonist himself only smiles or looks at the sky.

9. The truth is told only to outsiders

Shukichi to his old friend Numata: "This is the selfishness of parents in this world, and selfishness has no end"; Tomiko to her daughter-in-law Noriko: "If you find a suitable person, then marry him"; Shukichi at the end to Noriko: "Compared with my own children, it's you, who should count as an outsider..."; Akiko to Yuriko; Kojuro to Ohana.
Instruction: put the most private lines in relationships outside blood; give the "thematic debate" to the two young characters (Kyoko/Noriko), and give the "emotional conclusion" to one ordinary domestic remark ("If I'd known it would be like this, I should have treated her better while she was alive").

10. Mirror characters

Ono's remarriage (*Late Spring*) → the father's "remarriage"; Numata's son, "the section chief is called the department head" (*Tokyo Story*) → Shukichi's disappointment; the gourd father and daughter (72/48, noodle shop) → the Hirayama father and daughter (57/24) thirty years later; Horie's 28-year-old second wife → the comic version of remarriage.
In *An Autumn Afternoon*: Hirayama sees the gourd father and daughter (26–27) → hears Kawai say "If you're not careful, you'll end up like this too" (30) → hears the gourd man confess, "For convenience's sake, I kept my daughter by my side and made her serve me... I was wrong" (57) → that night when he gets home he asks, "Don't you want to marry?" (60). The decision is never given through the protagonist's own inner monologue.
Instruction: give the protagonist someone who has already lived through the protagonist's future, and have the protagonist make the decision that same night after seeing him. Use a minor character to "rehearse" the theme first (Noriko first says Ono's remarriage is "dirty"), then transfer the same situation to the protagonist.

11. Child subplot as metaphor

In *Early Summer*, Minoru wants train tracks, the father brings back bread → kicks the bread → gets hit → runs away; at the same time the whole family is choosing a "good match" for Noriko—what the adults give is bread, what the child wants is train tracks.
In *Tokyo Story*, Minoru rages that his desk has been moved into the corridor; in *Late Spring*, the baseball bat is painted red.
Instruction: let the child rage over a small object, and that small object is the metaphor for the main line; the two lines do not need to refer to each other in dialogue.

12. Group-scene catchphrase relay

In *Early Summer*, scene 40 has the three women's "Right?" "Don't you think so?" "Right?" in a parallel tongue-twister, with the married faction and the unmarried faction facing off; in *Early Autumn*, scene 65 has the trio: "—Oh, there's no hurry..." "Yes, there's no hurry..."
Instruction: in group scenes, relay one short phrase among three people, using repetition to create alignment and rhythm rather than content.

13. Displaced quarrel

In *Late Spring*, scene 68, the quarrel over the cream cake: "Please eat it for me!" "I just don't want to eat it!" "I tell you, eat it for me! Even if you don't eat it, I'll make you eat it!" "I just won't!"—from beginning to end they quarrel over "whether to eat cake," but the actual content is "whether to marry."
In Early Summer, the Takako couple's quarrel is over carrots and a pipe; in An Autumn Afternoon, the Koichi couple's is over golf clubs and a white handbag (45–51).
Instruction: characters never quarrel over the real problem, but over a small object; all dialogue is short sentences repeated, expressing emotion through rhythm rather than content. Use a young couple's dispute over an object to tell the audience "what marriage is" instead of discoursing on marriage.

14. The Single-Monologue Principle

Each film has only one long speech, placed in the penultimate section: Shukichi on happiness (Late Spring 93, about 300 characters), Akiko's last night (Early Autumn 101), the gourd's confession (An Autumn Afternoon 57), Shukichi on selfish desire (Tokyo Story 101). All the earlier "mm" and "..." are building force for it.
Instruction: the entire script allows only one speech longer than 150 characters, placed at the final outlet of emotion.
Series conversion: "one film" becomes, in a series, movement/block: each block allows only one such speech, placed in the block's penultimate episode or the episode's penultimate section; counting by episode would produce a dozen long speeches in a season, and all the buildup would be lost. For how blocks are divided, see sw-series-engine-bible item 19.

15. Ending Decrement

Late Spring: tavern → home → empty shot; An Autumn Afternoon: friend's house → bar → home → dressing mirror in the dark; Early Autumn: trio's restaurant (laughter) → apartment (folding the outer coat) → empty corridor.
Instruction: after the climax, decrement according to "social space → semi-private space → home → uninhabited space," with the final scene uninhabited. Give one scene each to the comedy line and the loneliness line, laughter first and then emptiness.

III. Character Configuration Template

Position	Function	Examples in Each Film
The one left behind	The parent who is left, the protagonist; emotionally passive, enduring	Shukichi ×3, Akiko, Kihachi, Hirayama
The one who leaves	Daughter/son/deceased wife; the decision is made in an instant, the reason given only as a life-like metaphor	Noriko ×3, Ayako, Michiko, Akemi, Tomiko
The promoter	Matchmaking/urging/pressuring, has selfish motives, makes mistakes in handling things	Aunt Masako, Director Satake, the trio, Sumiko
The contrast	A friend the same age as the one who leaves, holding the opposite position (divorcee/unmarried faction/sushi shop daughter)	Aya, Yuriko, Takako
The mirror	The protagonist's future	Onodera, Numata, the gourd, Horie
The intermediary	Message-bearer	Sister-in-law Shige, son Koichi, daughter-in-law Akiko, aunt
The absent one	The dead/missing person, paired with a concrete object	Mother (watch), Shoji (wheat ear), Shoji (photo/quilt), Miwa Shuzo (pipe), Kimura (the advance guard who never returned)
The onlooker	The frame at the beginning and end	The neighbor's wife ("How fortunate you are"/"It's lonely again"), the Shige couple, the waiting-room attendant

Configuration points:

The promoter's motives must be written honestly: In Early Autumn, the three old men's main motive is a secret love for their deceased friend's wife, and the wives all know it and laugh at them ("They treat her as a source of amusement").
Every line spoken by the harshest character must make sense: Shibafu offers three thousand yen to send [her] to Atami, "it's even more economical"; "best if the mourning clothes we bring aren't needed"; right after the mother dies, she asks for a sash and hemp cloth; "it would've been better if Father had gone first"—she isn't a bad person, just "busy." The script never judges her; the judging is left to the audience and the younger characters.
The moralist betrays in the very next scene: In *Floating Weeds*, Kiyoshi angrily denounces a companion who wants to steal money—"forget someone's kindness and you're worse than dog shit"—and in the next scene runs off with the troupe leader's wallet. No explanation.
The absent one as glue: The war-dead Shoji runs through *Early Summer*—the credit investigation office finds that "Shoji and Kenkichi were classmates" → "he won't be coming back" → "in Shoji's letter there was an ear of barley" → the film's title. Noriko's trust in Kenkichi comes from "he was my brother's friend."
The dead need only a living person who's "a bit like" them: "There's a woman over there who looks like your mother when she was young... when she lowers her head, just a little, right here, she looks like her." No flashback scene needed.
Old forms of address bring out layers of time: The teachers all go by nicknames (Gourd, Lion, Raccoon Dog, Emperor); Sakamoto calls Hirayama "Captain"; Hirayama calls Gourd "Teacher." The moment they open their mouths, relationships from decades ago come out.

IV. The main "marrying off a daughter" structure template (ready to apply directly)

Combining the sequence of passages from *Late Spring*, *Early Summer*, *Early Autumn*, and *An Autumn Afternoon*:

Passage	Content	Writing method
Prologue	Idle talk at the station/breakfast/anniversary of a death; empty shots establish the season	Establish the whole family's relationships through an observer or a meal; the topic of marrying off the daughter appears in the very first scene (the clerk "chipping in" at the start of An Autumn Afternoon)
Setup	The everyday ease between father and daughter (mother and daughter)	Dependence of the "pour tea, pour tea" kind; the surface of the dialogue is "small talk" (asking directions, mahjong, spelling)
False lead	Make the audience mistakenly think someone is the match (Hattori)	Use comic timing for the reversal (Noriko stifles a laugh and asks for tea)
First push	The pusher proposes the match; the daughter refuses, on the grounds that she "has to look after Father/Mother"	The proposed match never appears on screen
Mirror appears	The protagonist sees her own future (Gourd and his daughter / Onodera's remarriage)	First have the daughter evaluate the mirror figure ("remarrying is dirty")
Midpoint	The pusher suggests the parent remarry (truly or falsely)	The daughter "suddenly darkens"—the real wound has been touched
Cold war	Almost no dialogue	"I'm going shopping..." and she leaves forlornly; empty seats in the theater
Wordless climax	A nod / a return bow / a gaze at the Noh theater	Write jealousy through gazing; not a single line about the marriage in the whole scene
Displaced outburst	Quarrel over cake/a golf club	Short sentences repeated
Showdown	Three "mm"s	The daughter rushes upstairs crying
Decision	The foil urges marriage ("men are all no good... just get married once"); the daughter agrees	The parent asks, "You're not marrying because you've given up, are you?"—the decision is reluctant, and the parent knows it
Farewell journey	Kyoto/Ikaho/Haruna Lake	The only long monologue is placed here
Wedding day	In front of the mirror, one line "Dad..." → "Oh, I understand" → the empty room is left with only the mirror and the chair	Wedding = a photograph or a group photo
Epilogue	Bar → home → empty shot	The truth is revealed by a third party; the apple peel breaks while being pared; humming the Warship March, "all alone"

Variations:

"Early Summer" places the "decision" in front of the wrong person (Kenkichi's mother says, "You were just dreaming it up on your own"), does not show the protagonist's wedding, and closes with a stranger's bridal procession.
"Late Autumn" writes the promoters as a comedic trio with selfish motives, and the accusation falls on an innocent person (when the daughter calls her mother "filthy," the mother has no idea—the audience knows the truth first).
"An Autumn Afternoon" adds "missing out": the person the daughter likes is already involved with someone else, and the reason is the father's own hesitation ("Didn't you say at the time that she wouldn't be marrying for a while yet?")—The protagonist's hesitation itself becomes the cause of the loss, pointed out in a single line by a third party.

V. The reusable skeleton of the "bereavement" structure ("Tokyo Story")

The opening bystander's frame: "How fortunate."
Arrival: the son's home is not as imagined—only one line, "I thought it would be a bit livelier," with no comment.
The first time they are set aside: the children's anger expresses it on the old people's behalf.
Being "outsourced": the daughter calls and asks the daughter-in-law to take care of it.
The only sincere hospitality uses "borrowed" sake and takeout.
What the children think of as filial piety = sending the parents away (Atami); the foreshadowing of illness is only one action line, "she swayed as if dizzy."
Midpoint: the old man's only comment on his own situation is spoken with a laugh, "So we've ended up homeless after all."
Two parallel nights: the father's drinking session and the mother's night talk at the daughter-in-law's place are cross-cut—one speaks disappointment while indulging, the other speaks compassion under the covers, and the two are not together all night. The audience pieces their words together for them.
The death foreshadowing is passed over three times: "she swayed a little," "she's been forgetting things lately," "if anything happens, you don't need to rush back"—each time someone cuts it off with a laugh.
The death occurs in an empty shot.
Funeral: mourning and calculation at the same table; the saying is first said as a joke and later as regret.
Chain of object transmission: Shoji's photograph → Shoji's quilt → Fusako's watch → on the train, Kyoko holds the watch close to her ear. The final object is "listened to" at the end.
The ending returns to the neighbor's wife: "It's quiet again."

VI. Secret-type structure ("Floating Weeds"): layered secret-leak chain

The audience knows first (scenes 23–27) → Yatakura sees it in the barbershop mirror (45) → Sumiko interrogates (48) → Ogi rises to "a bond for life" (50) → Rokuzaburo identifies him through the lattice window in the accompaniment room (57) → Sumiko storms into the shop (69) → Kayo is sent (77) → Aki knows Kayo was sent (90) → Ofuku reveals the parentage (115).
Each link transmits only a little, and all pass through a "third person"; the protagonist himself never says it on his own initiative.
Information is conveyed through "seeing" rather than "hearing": mirrors, lattice windows, "(telephoto)," "telephoto from the inner room"—the script specifies the viewpoint.
The exploited person's confession is the turning point (Kayo: "I was actually trying to deceive you at first"), not being exposed.
At the moment the truth is revealed, there is only rejection("I don't want Father! Tell him to get out!"), and reconciliation is left off-screen (A Fang: "In her heart, she has actually already forgiven him").
The protagonist's violence is countered for the last time, and the one who counters is the person he most wants to protect (his son throws a punch back, and immediately the secret of his birth is exposed).
The big quarrel escalates inthree levels: debt of gratitude → origins → bloodline, and the final line must be irrevocable ("My son, he is not, with you people, an ordinary race").
The play-within-the-play's lines predict the main plot's ending (Chuji: "Setting out on a journey with no purpose and no end" → Kojuro boards the night train); let "those watching the play" also be watched.
Reconciliation uses a small action that can be repeated twice: the first match is refused, the second is accepted, and then "borrow a light" is used to light it in return, with not a single apology throughout.

7. Dialogue Writing

1. The surface is "small talk"

Directional questions and answers ("Is the sea this way?" "No, it's this way"), mahjong ling shang kai hua, the spelling of Liszt LISZT, "What are we performing this time?"
Function: to establish a relaxed relationship;to let important words be spoken while sandwiched between idle talk("How is Aji?" "This child is about due to be settled").
Instruction: hide the key lines in the middle of idle talk, wrapping them with idle talk before and after.

2. Tone adverb bank (original stage-direction words)

faintly / coldly / vaguely / cheerfully / with a beaming smile / forlornly / as if talking to oneself / lowering the voice / as if nothing were the matter / with deep emotion / unable to restrain oneself / with increasing sharpness / as if doubting one's own ears / full of emotion / still muttering contentedly / suddenly wilting.

3. One catchphrase per person

A Fang: "I've long been used to it" "He'll come back... he'll definitely come back"; Kojuro: "Ah, there's really no way with this trade"; Shukichi: "Hmm..."; Shishige: "You really are something." Repetition is character.

4. Give motivation only through one everyday metaphor

Noriko explains why she is marrying Kenkichi: "It's like when you're cutting clothes and don't know where you put the scissors, and after searching everywhere, you find they were right in front of you." Aya presses: "Then that's liking him!" Noriko insists: "No! ...It's that I can trust him."No psychological explanation is given.

5. Theme sentences are spoken by the young, and the older generation misreads and relays them in idle chat

Ayako: "Love and marriage should be considered separately" → the three old men repeat it at the golf course: "That shows the times are getting harder and harder."

6. The three steps of acceptance

Accept with a smile ("It's all right, Father... I just don't want to regret it later") → a third party reports crying ("Sister seems to be crying") → the parent goes upstairs and says, "If you don't like it, it's all right to refuse," then goes out into the corridor to look at the sky.

7. Ritual actions replace confession

A group photo (Noriko asks to take one more of her parents alone, with no line saying "this is the last time"), a farewell banquet, applying lipstick in the mirror (= saying goodbye to life in Tokyo), folding an outer garment, peeling an apple.

8. The "queue of reactions" after major news

Early Summer 118–121: family meeting → the parents lack the strength to go upstairs → Noriko applies lipstick → Koichi and his wife remain where they are; 133–134: the old couple suddenly stand up and walk out → Koichi goes to the desk → Shiko writes characters in the ashes → Noriko eats tea over rice in the icy atmosphere.Each character reacts alone in their own space, one scene each; no group arguments are written.

VIII. Script Format Standards (Summarized from the Original Text)

**场号　地点（　时间/说明）**            ← 加粗；地点在前，时间可省
一行景物或动作描述——                      ← 破折号结尾＝延续/未完
人名：台词。（括号内动作/语气）             ← 动作插在台词中
人名：……                                  ← 沉默是一整句台词
人名：（冷淡地）什么？                     ← 语气提示放句首括号
说着走出。                                 ← 动作单独成行，主语常省略

Scenes are extremely short: averaging 1–1.5 pages, the shortest being one line ("22 The Spring Sun Society Poster"）。
A single movement is split into multiple scene numbers: entryway → hallway → living room, one scene each (the 30–35 scenes of Tokyo Story are continuous action within the same house).
Time notation only at the beginning of a paragraph: "the next day," "that evening," "several days later."
When a character first appears, note age and identity in parentheses: "Noriko (28 years old, wife of Shukichi's second son Shoji, killed in the war)."
Stage directions include the director's viewpoint: "(telephoto)," "telephoto from the inner room," "overhead view."
Scene samples:

**12　翌日　镰仓车站的站台**
开往东京的上行电车刚刚开出——车站的时钟——指着大约十点三十八分。

**13　龟谷隧道附近**
上行列车疾驰而去。
而后驶出隧道——

**14　三等车厢内**
混杂中周吉和纪子站在摇晃的车中。
周吉：你把稿子带上了吧？
纪子：嗯，您放心。

IX. List of Theme Sentences (Can Be Quoted or Adapted Directly)

"Happiness won't wait for you; you have to create it yourselves. Marriage itself is not happiness." (Late Spring)
"Somewhere, there must be a child crying because he accidentally let go of his balloon." (Early Summer)
"Right now may be the best time for our family. ... People's greed knows no bounds." (Early Summer)
"So we've become homeless after all..." (Tokyo Story, said with a smile)
"This is the selfishness of parents in this world, and selfishness knows no bounds." (Tokyo Story)
"Once children grow up, they must leave their parents. ... Everyone, no matter who, thinks their own life is the most important." (Tokyo Story)
"Love and marriage should be considered separately." (Late Autumn)
"At this point, having to climb the mountain again from the foot, I've really had enough." (Late Autumn)
"For my own convenience, I kept my daughter by my side to run errands for me... In the end, life is just oneself alone." (An Autumn Afternoon)
"Better to have no father at all than one who's an actor." (Floating Weeds)
"When everyone gets together, it just makes things complicated, but it turns out it was actually quite simple." (Late Autumn)

The positional pattern of theme sentences: they appearwhile looking at scenery(the broken balloon string, the wheat field, "What a beautiful morning" on the cliff), not during arguments.

X. Workflow: Writing an Ozu-Style Script

Define the leaver and the one who stays. Write a one-sentence story: "X (age, identity), in order to make Y leave, did Z; after Y leaves, X alone..."
Define the promoter and their selfish motive; give the promoter a way of handling things that can go wrong (eating an apple, holding a pipe, directing from behind a paper door).
Define the mirror character: Who has already lived through the protagonist's future? Arrange the scene where the protagonist sees him and the decision that night.
Define the absent person and the object: the dead/missing person + one concrete object (wheat ear, watch, pipe, photograph).
List the three biggest events, all moved off-screen; for each event write the "scene before" and the "scene after," and use an empty shot for the event itself.
Choose one echoing object/catchphrase, arrange for it to appear three times, with progressively deeper meaning.
Design a subplot involving a child or a young couple, using a small object to enact the main line's lesson.
Write the showdown scene: only "Hmm" and "..." are allowed; the other person asks three times in a row.
Write displacement quarrel: quarrel over cake/club, short sentences repeated.
Write the only long monologue, placed in the second-to-last paragraph (night talk on the journey).
Write the ending in decreasing order: social space→home→empty shot with no one; one comedic scene + one lonely scene.
Format check: scene numbers bold, location first, dashes continued, silence as a sentence, first appearance with age and identity in parentheses, transitional empty shots as independent scene numbers.

11. Self-check list

Does the protagonist directly voice their own grievance at any point in the film? (They should not—it is said by a supporting character)
Is the most important admission longer than one syllable?
Does the rejected person show their face? (They should not)
Is there a line of empty shot between each emotional segment?
Is there only one long line, and is it in the second-to-last paragraph?
Is the quarrel about a small object rather than the real problem?
Is there anyone in the final scene at the end? (There should not be)
Is the theme sentence said while looking at the scenery?
Is the driver's selfish motive exposed with a smile by someone else (wife/outsider)?
Does the deceased have an object or a living person who is "a bit like" them?