noriko’s father, shukichi, works as a college professor and is the sole breadwinner of the somiya family. it has been suggested that the character represents a transition from the traditional image of the japanese father to a very different one. sato points out that the national "prewar" ideal of the father was that of the stern patriarch, who ruled his family lovingly, but with an iron hand. ozu himself, however, in several prewar films, such as "i was born, but…" and "passing fancy", had undercut, according to sato, this image of the archetypal strong father by depicting parents who were downtrodden "salarymen" ("sarariman", to use the japanese term), or poor working-class laborers, who sometimes lost the respect of their rebellious children. bordwell has noted that "what is remarkable about ozu's work of the 1920s and 1930s is how seldom the patriarchal norm is reestablished at the close [of each film]."