Despite her impact, Ayu Sumikawa does not enjoy the same level of international recognition as her contemporaries like Machiko Kyo or Hideko Takamine. This is partly due to the genre she inhabited; "Sun Tribe" films were often dismissed by high-brow critics as commercial fluff. However, film historians have recently begun to re-evaluate this era, recognizing that these films captured the authentic pulse of 1950s Japan.