Your basic garden-variety film fan prides himself on more than a passing acquaintance with movies made in countries and languages other than their own. While art houses have permitted access to the likes of Bergman, Bunuel, Truffaut and Fellini, we have the home video medium to thank for movies from more obscure sources and those more deeply etched into the culture of any given region. Taking Japanese films as an example, in addition to more familiar directors like Kurosawa, Kobayashi, Inagaki and Mizoguchi, we are now able to order up Mikio Naruse, Yazujiro Ozu, Kon Ichikawa, Sadao Yamanaka and Masahiro Shinoda - to name the first ones that come to mind - from local or imported sources, and enjoy them regardless of video region coding. Anime? Anything we want, many with English subtitles, at the click of the finger, from creative forces other than Miyazaki.

That's a pretty impressive list, as far as it goes, but there are treasures, great and small, about which we Westerners are pretty clueless. Among these are the 48 Tora-san movies that came out about twice yearly from 1969 to 1995 – all with the same actor in the lead role and the same director (in all but two). If you thought Ozu sums up the gist of everyday life in postwar Japan, you are in for something of a surprise – a shock for some.

The Tora-san movies play more like a TV family sitcom – indeed, that's what the story was before the TV series came to an a sudden and untimely death. The transition from the small screen to the big screen was natural enough, though the cumulative effect exceeded every imaginable expectation. The hero of these adventures is one Torajiro Kuruma – "Tora-san" or "Our Lovable Tramp" – though he should not be confused with the Charlie Chaplin character. Stuart Galbraith IV, who provides exhaustive details and background for the series on the audio commentary for the first movie (not coincidentally titled "Tora-san" - Our Lovable Tramp") sees him more as Oliver Hardy or Jackie Gleason's Ralph Kramden, and I would have to agree.

Hardy and Kramden have an exaggerated view of their abilities and their effect on others (dare we call them "liars"?) and while they often seem to mean well, in their small ways they are not above running roughshod over those they obviously care about. The difference between Tora-san and Hardy or Kramden, as I see it, is that the Americans keep their humiliations of others relatively intimate, whereas Tora-san is so oblivious to the juggernaut that he is, he is perfectly willing to embarrass those he most cares about publicly. (It is of no small importance that neither Kramden nor Hardy find themselves knee-deep in booze, which accounts for a good deal of Tora-san outrageous behavior)

Depending on how you feel about all this, and the subsequent forgiveness by the person so humiliated, you will either have a good time or be royally pissed off. In the first film I was very much in the latter group since there was nothing in the movie that could explain Sakura's acceptance of her brother's careless and, on once occasion, violent, behavior to her. It's the sort of thing that a familiarity with the TV series or (thank you, Stuart) a better appreciation of Japanese family ties would have explained. I only say that you should come to the first film prepared. Tora-san might not be as "lovable" as advertised. From the second film on, and with Sakura happily married, Tora-san is a far less distressing character, but then he also becomes predictable and less dimensional.

Back to Oliver and Ralph for a moment: American audiences both identify with and feel an appropriate level of embarrassment for the buffoonery of Hardy and Kramden, and we know and expect that they will get theirs soon enough. And, even though a lesson is meted out to Ralph in every episode of "The Honeymooners" and in just about every movie – short and long – of Oliver & Hardy, we see them return the next time for another round of much the same. It's as though we ourselves receive the pie in the face that these guys get. Anyhow, it beats the hell out of going to confession.

Tora-san (Kiyoshi Atsimi) is uneducated, a drunkard, a gambler, and a low level yakuza (i.e. a black market peddler) who left home in his teens. When he finally returns after 20 years, he finds his parents and older brother dead, leaving his only surviving sibling – a sister (Chieko Baisho) whom he enjoyed making fun of as a child and seems to feel it would be a betrayal of his dignity to see her otherwise now even though she has a responsible job and an education. The fact that she is also beautiful must really rankle his spirit no end.

In much the same way as any American sitcom, the plots for the Tora-san movies are roughly the same: Tora-san finds himself in one or another Japanese locale, meets a new beauty, falls in love with her, and thanks to his foolish and social awkwardness and stupidity, helps to bring about a match with another suitor, leaving Tora-san to hit the road once again. (I'm not entirely sure why, but I can't help but think of the TV series The Fugitive, with Tora-san as both Janssen and the one-armed man.)

Like many a TV series, each movie will introduce a new lovely actress and feature one or two A-list actors in recurring and new roles. In the first movie, for example, no less a presence than Takashi Shimura, the leader of the Seven Samurai, delivers a touching show-stopping scene as the repentant father of the groom.

One parting thought: 40 years of postwar Japan is a long enough period to have witnessed profound social, economic and technological change. I gather that Tora-san, the man, is little affected, but the streets where he walks and the people he meets have. I'm looking forward to seeing how that all works out.

Leonard Norwitz