Kinoshita's important contribution to the immediate postwar cycle of films concerns the sufferings of a liberal family disintegrating under the pressures of the war and welcoming the dawn of democracy. Kinoshita shot Morning for the Osone Family within the confines of a one-house interior set, capturing the emotional insularity of the wartime experience for any one family. The focus, typically, is on the mother, who allows her militarist brother-in-law, a self-serving reactionary, to dictate the family's destiny. Thus she loses two sons to the war, and a third is imprisoned for his antiwar activities. Kinoshita at once underscores the mother's impotence and the strength of her convictions and those of her more outspoken daughter. "A bitter look back at responsibility for the war, a new interpretation of democracy as popular justice instead of license, and encouragement for women to assert themselves" (Audie Bock, Japanese Film Directors).