Review: Dr. Lamb

Text © Richard Gary / Indie Horror Films, 202
Images from the Internet

Dr. Lamb (aka Goh yeung yee sang)
Directed by Danny Lee; Billy Hin-Shing Tang
Grand River Film Ltd.; Heroes United Films Ltd.; Unearthed Classics; MVD Entertainment
89 minutes, 1992 / 2022
www.unearthedfilms.com
www.MVDVisual.com/
Hong Kong is not well known for having serial killers making headlines (there have been two as of this writing). This story is somewhat loosely based on one of them. Released in Hong Kong in Cantonese (also available on this Blu-ray in Mandarin or English subtitles), it became one the highest grossing horror films in the city, gathering a Category III Rating (adults only). This new 30 Anniversary Edition is completely uncut, taken from the original negative in 2K, so it is nice and crip.

Simon Yam

The main characters here are Lamb, Lam Gor-Yu (Simon Yam) as the InCel taxi-driver/photographer wannabe turned serial killer, and the main police officer chasing him, Inspector Lee (co-director Danny Lee). The change from Lam to Lamb (I will call him Lam going forward) was most likely a mistake on the English translation, or to keep hidden somewhat that it was a foreign film. At the time this was released, it was towards the end of the great Chinese influx of films, that were mainly Kung Fu or police dramas. With waning interest, and the closing of many Chinese-exclusive theaters (I went to one in Chinatown in New York on occasion with Shaw Bros. aficionado Mariah Aguiar that was torn down shortly after this film came out), and Blockbuster-type superstores that did not show these Category III films very often and were usually grainy or heavily edited, there was a reason to lean to the avoidance of foreign releases. The original Cantonese title translates as “Hong Kong Female Butcher.” But it was the start of a new resurgence of Extreme Asian cinema from Hong Kong.

The film is nicely broken up into consecutive sections. The first deals with Lam’s childhood in an overcrowded city, living with his extended family, including parents, siblings, aunt, uncle and cousins, all in the same small apartment. Even as a pre-teen, the sexual component of his personality was already showing signs of, well, being weird.

Danny Lee

The second section is post-murders, and he and his whole family are arrested, though they know it is Lam who is the killer. He is abused by the police (something quite common in that period, from what I know) and even his own kin.

In the third, when the police focus on Lam, we get to see his crimes in quite shocking detail, including butchery with a saw and scalpel (hence the title), as he keeps body part “mementos.” Yes, this is a pretty gruesome third act that gives it the Category III rating. Definitely not for the squeamish as there are close-ups of his actions. This is a gorehound’s dream that is worth the wait.

And as malevolent as Lam is, it actually doesn’t come close to what the real killer did in his crimes. This would definitely be considered a “Video Nasty” in Britain at the time of its initial release in 1992.

Comic relief cops

There is definitely a level of social commentary mixed in with the story, especially with the abuse Lam had suffered through most of his life, between the tight-quartered family who were not nice people, and the police violence against him. But it is not overt and does not hit the viewer over the head with it. It also does not make any excuses for Lam’s extreme actions.

Yet, with all the violence and body parts, the film is quite beautifully shot and edited, especially during the murder sequences, with odd angles, cool red lights, and a focus on the horrific action. I also enjoyed the scenes in the rain, which reminded me of Blade Runner (1982). Speaking of Runner, as Lam drives around in his taxi, we see some scenes of the city, full of bright neon lights. It is a bit overwhelming and yet beautiful at the same time. Reminds me in some ways of the lights over the bar at CBGB, times 10.

There are some really nice extras added to the Blu-ray, including a full-length commentary by Art Ettinger, editor of Ultra Violent magazine, and Bruce Holecheck, of Cinema Arcana). Their commentary is a bit dry, but their history of the genre is riveting, as they discuss the real case, the history of Category III films, and the backgrounds of the directors, the cast and the crew. Then there are the documentaries and interviews.

First up is “Lamb to the Slaughter: An interview with filmmaker Gilbert Po, who initiated the Dr. Lamb film project” (20 min). In English, Po explains with history and humor, how the idea of the film originated, about the Category III rating, filming anecdotes, and the placement of the film in the culture of both Hong Kong and the rest of the world. Next up is “Three Times the Fear: Film Critic James Mudge on the Golden Era of Category III” (21 min.). This could have been pretty mundane, but it is kept interesting because rather just focusing on the overview of the genre, he mainly discusses the film’s placement in the culture, and how the two leads of this film also did many other Category III films, thereby subtly bringing up multiple others.

Then there is “Cut and Run: Film academic Sean Tierney aka The Silver Spleen remembers Dr. Lamb” (16 min). I was a bit nervous about this one due to the term “academic” and I thought it was going to be dry as dust, but Tierney is actually quite engaging, and I totally respect that he does not just glorify the film, but also points at some flaws (in his opinion), which is actually rare in these commentaries. The last featurette is the “Atomic TV Interview with Simon Yam” (9 min), which is the only one of the four documentary extras that is archival, from a 2000 Anime convention. Yam discusses his overall career.

The last two extras are a bunch of trailers from Unearthed, all but one has been reviewed on this blog. The other is a nice glossy color print collector’s booklet that comes in the clam shell.

It is no surprise to me that this had a Category III rating. There is a lot of nudity, and torture; typical Unearthed fare, which is a strong compliment.

IMDB listing HERE

 

Reviews: 5 Various Zombie Themed Films: Pop Punk Zombies; Zombie Fight Club; Zombie Hunter; Zombie Women of Satan; Female Zombie Riot

 Reviews: 5 Various Zombie Themed Films

Text © Richard Gary / Indie Horror Films, 2022
Images from the Internet

For a while there, Zombie-based films were everywhere. Arguably, the “death knell” of zombies are being constant was the television show “The Walking Dead.” At first, it started a new spurt of Zombie releases, but as it went on and the story started to deteriorate (as most shows on for that long do), it started to cool down a bit. But it never went away. Other than found footage, it seems like Zombie films appears to be a choice for new filmmakers. It’s understandable. There is a lot of bang for the buck, and showing off SFX is a nice notch in the director’s belt.

These films below are not ranked), but are listed alphabetically (with one exception as it is a sequel), all from TubiTV. Note that my snark is truly meant to be fun and rib-poking with a touch of stream of consciousness, and I looked for titles that were a bit…different. I had just the right low-budget expectation for these films, so I was not blindsided by anticipating a theatrical extravaganza experience. After all, when it comes to the cheese level, there are times when ya want melted brie on artisan bread, and at others, Cheez-Whiz on animal crackers. I enjoyed these films for precisely what they are. All of these releases are recent, since the millennium. Links to the coming attractions for all of them are at the bottom of each review.

 

Pop Punk Zombies
Directed by Steve Dayton
Staytone Productions
84 minutes, 2011
You know how on social media when the question comes up “which band would you have liked to have seen,” usually giving images of dead musicians? This film takes that one step further…perhaps more. Dameon David (Adam Hatfield) is a music producer. What he does is wait in cemeteries for the undead musicians to rise, and then captures them and trains them to play the titular pop punk in a band called Viscous Vegan (great group name, actually). Yeah, I know this makes no sense and is kind of insulting to musicians who have put their lives into their music. But let’s see where this takes us. The (living) protagonist of the film is Eddy (Ian Kane), who just broke up with his girlfriend, Lisa (Laura Savage); 5 minutes in, and I can already see where this is going. There is also Eddy’s best friend, Ciez Jones (Nick Marinnuci). And what I see, in part, is the gray filter used to make this look almost black and white, with some color as an artistic choice (makes it easier to hide the color of the fake blood later on). As Eddy and Ciez go into the club, The Warehouse (a music joint in Lacrosse, Wisconsin), it is obviously a real music venue by the posters of shows on the wall, such as SNFU, Jesus Lizard, and The Melvins. While there is good music on the soundtrack by the likes of The Disabled and Cockney Americans, as for the Vicious Vegans…not so much. When the show starts, a member of a “rights” group (think PETA for zombies) lets the zombie musicians loose, and then the second act and the fun starts. Will Eddy be able to save himself? And what about Lisa, who is also at the gig? Either way, there is plenty of young’ns in the place (to which they are all locked in) to build up a nice body count. The slaughter starts relatively early, so I’m wondering how they are going to fill up the time. For once, the zombies stand straight up, are smart, and they are fast and strong. They even know how to fist-fight and on occasion have calm conversations. These aren’t your normal Romero ramblers, and there is little consistency with zombie behaviors throughout. The story is incredibly silly, and the acting matches it. The editing is also annoying in that whomever did it must have been brought up on MTV videos because it is hard to tell what’s going on sometimes. I certainly appreciate that they tried to do something a little different here, but it doesn’t really work. The dialogue is bland and oft times nonsensical, the zombie movement is inconsistent, and the characters have zero personality. There is lots of gore shots, but in such close-up that it is hard to tell what we are looking at, at times. The dullness of the image (that near black and white thing I was talking about) hinders more than helps. One thing I did like, though, was the bit about social commentary, how zombies are just going to replace living humans in the work force. Sound familiar?
Trailer is HERE 

 

Zombie Fight Club (aka Shi cheng)
Directed by Joe Chien
Sun Entertainment Culture; Six Doors Film Productions; Scream Factory
95 minutes, 2014
There is no question where the title came from in this Taiwanese film, that is in both Mandarin and English; they seem to indiscriminately jump between the two, with clear captions for both. The original title translates to “Corpse City.” This is a nice mix of the zombie apocalypse, gladiator films, and a bit of the Resident Evil franchise. The first two acts starts “30 minutes before” the zombies hit the fan in a high-rise apartment building (taller the building, the more tenants, the more zombies). We are focused on a criminal cartel into drugs and kidnapping (and rapping), with lots of sex, cleavage and nudity (only female, of course) in the first 10 minutes. But then, the sky “looks funny,” as one character states, but it’s the bath salt pills that get people to start turning into (some are fast, some are slow) blood thirsty flesh eaters. It’s not because they died, they just changed. And did I mention this is on Halloween, so people think the zombies are just in make-up, at first? While the practical SFX make-up and gore looks pretty good, the CGI explosions, gunfire, and blood splatter (including the on the camera lens cliché), do not; it looks quite fake and distracting. When crooked soldiers come to attack the cartel to steal their money, in the middle of a zombie uprising, the action is bloody and enjoyable. Lots of close-ups and quick edits magnify the action. There is even an Oldboy (2003) style corridor fight, except with the undead rather than gangsters. Act three takes place one year later, with zombies ruling the world and a small group of the living being underground, ruled by a sadistic ex-school teacher (Jack Kao), who has a strange relationship with his zombie daughter Nana (Abby Fung), filling the “Bub” position from Day of the Dead (1985). He sets up a gladiatorial system of people fighting zombies in a bread and circuses situation, where he fills the Caligula role, gambling for the likes of water and leather-clad, bikini wearing women. This is a post-apoc version of the Christians vs. the lions. The zombies, at this point, have physically deteriorated, and the make-up nicely expresses that, being more skin-and-bones. At this stage, the two protagonists are Andy (Andy On), who was one of the “soldiers,” and Jenny (Jessica Canbensey), who we met in the first part. He is the top fighter (and there is a decent kung fu fight scene between him and another living human), and she is abused in other ways. Can they survive and make it out? And if they do, is there anything worth saving on the surface (shades of 1976’s Logan’s Run, Batman!).
Trailer is HERE 

 

Zombie Hunter
Directed by K. King
Arrowstorm Entertainment; The Klimax; Well Go USA Entertainment
93 minutes, 2013
https://www.facebook.com/zombiehuntermovie?fref=ts
I ain’t a-gonna lie: the reason I chose this one is because Danny Trejo is featured on the poster, and has top billing. Hopefully, it’s not just a cameo to sucker in suckers like me. The origin story of the zombies is told in the prologue: natas (seriously?) is a new drug (that looks like Pepto Bismol), much like with Zombie Fight Club (reviewed above), is the cause. The situation quickly escalates until the landscape looks like something out of a Mad Max scenario, right down to the narration by the anti-hero, of course named Hunter (Martin Copping), who even drives what looks like Max’s Interceptor car. He is bitter, bored, talks slowly in a raspy Christian Bale/Batman whisper without the lisp, and is a heavy drinker since he has not seen anyone alive (other than zombies, of course) in six months. Well, you keep riding around in the desert, what do you expect? Well, that’s just me, I guess. The film tries hard to be a bit artistic, and it does work, with the use of overlapping images, occasional monochrome filter, and title cards with the names of people, zombies (e.g., Death Angel), and “important objects” (e.g., Tequila). Flashbacks are stylized in red filters and look close to comic books (closer to Tim Virgil’s Faust than, say Spider-Man). Eventually, he forcefully gets involved with a commune, including tough Father Jesus (Trejo) that calls everyone “gringo,” slow witted bully and blow-hard Lyle (Jake Suazo), and the Ginger and Maryanne of the group, oversexed and cleavatious Fast Lane Debbie (model and exotic dancer Jade Regler, who gratuitously gets to show off her pole skills), and white-bread with a whole other side, Alison (Clare Niederpruem). The last two minimal characters are pilot Jerry (Terry Guthrie) and Alison’s 15-year-old brother who is both a horndog and dumb as a post, Ricky (Jason K. Wixom, who has a phenomenally long IMBD listing). The make-up effects look really fine and practical, and the blood splatter is incredibly obvious CGI. There is also a really cool (yet CGI) monster that is inconsistent, but enjoyable looking. Trejo gets to show off his familiar tats while calling the creature a “puta.” This made me laugh. While there is some extreme gore thrown in here and there in the first half, it picks up towards the middle, as does the road trip, in Zombieland fashion (2009), encountering “eaters” and some clown with a chain saw. There are a few good jump scares, and the action scenes are well choreographed and extremely bloody. That is on point. However, there is one thing that drove me crazy, and I have some questions. First, the annoying part: the inner monologues are annoying and unneeded. Perhaps they were looking for a Noir flair? As for the questions: where does Hunter get his stream of cigarettes and booze? And where do the women get all their make-up, especially Fast Lane Debbie, who wears a ton? And I hope I wasn’t that stupid when I was 15 (between him and Lyle, the word “retarded” comes up a few times in the dialogue). Actually, nearly everybody makes some bad choices, some more than once. Also, why does the amount of blood on Alison’s white top keep changing? Sometimes the blood of the zombies is red, others it is that Pepto pink. Why? And what were those creatures? Despite my questions, I found this very satisfactory in the bloodletting and especially the zombie make-up.
Trailer is HERE 

 

Zombie Women of Satan
Directed by Warren Speed and Steve O’Brien
24:25 Films; Growling Clown Entertainment
85 minutes, 2009
www.facebook.com/ZombieWomenOfSatan
www.growlingclown.com
Somewhere in England’s northeast, there is a traveling carny group called Flesharama, who have a strip club called The House of the Golden Lotus. They include (of course) the nearly always shirtless Sydney Smallcock, aka Pervo the Clown (writer, co-director Warren Speed), the ringmaster Johnny Dee Hellfire (Seymore Leon Mace), who is also the manager of the mangy troupe, trying to keep them somewhat in line while women are twirling their pasties on stage but, if you’ll pardon the cliché, it’s like herding stoned sex-crazed cats. For some reason, there is also well-known rock singer, Skye Brannigan (Victoria Hopkins). There are a few others, but they are more future fodder, as there is not a likeable character among them, which seems to be a common thread in zombie films so we can cheer their demises without guilt. Meanwhile, out in the countryside, Tycho (Christian Steel) is running a cult of himself and a bunch of loosely clad and beautiful women on a rural and isolated farm (think Spahn Ranch and Manson). This locale is also where in the basement, a mad scientist and father of Tycho, Dr. Zander (Bill Fellows) is experimenting on other women that are brought to him by his leather corseted daughter, Red (Maryisa Kay), for scientific experiments to form zombies is carried out. Our carnival and stripper end up there for a podcast interview, and viola, so much for “never the twain shall meet.” Once the half-clad (and seemingly really bored) women of the cult accidentally get dosed with the zombie formula, that’s when the start of the second act and the fun begins. The mentality of the film is somewhere around a 15 years old teen boy. For example, the sheer amount of bare breasted zombies, masturbation, sex with said zombies, parents who are deranged, and extended shitting/fart scene that is about three times longer than it needs to be (sorry, but after Blazing Saddles in 1973, this kind of fart joke is passe); though a shorter fart joke earlier works better. The story is kind of silly and the dialogue is about Middle School level, with profanity substituting for anything meaningful. I’m talking generally, because there are some really good lines in here as well; The acting is decent though occasionally a bit over-the-top, though Hopkins comes out the best (there is a reason she’s top billed). As for the communion, the blood and gore mostly look pretty good, though occasionally the blood looks a bit syrupy at times. It’s a bit of a mindless watch, but sometimes that just what ya need, right?
Trailer is HERE 

 

Female Zombie Riot (aka Zombie Women of Satan 2; Female Zombie Riot: Not Walking Dead, Hot Babe Zombies Galore, get your Grindhouse on!)
Directed by Warren Speed and Chris Greenwood
Growling Clown Entertainment; Bearded Maverick; Gravitas Ventures
95 minutes, 2016
www.facebook.com/ZombieWomenOfSatan
www.growlingclown.com
This film picks up a couple of years after the conclusion of the first film. Pervo has become a “Justin Bieber,” hero media darling that transformed into a tattooed, drinker who has fallen from grace, but remains true to his nickname. Even from the start of the film, there are bare breasts a-bouncin’ everywhere. The other part of the story is of the Zander clan, who ran the cult in the first film. Well, what’s left of them as they are all over-the-top insane, and they plan to kill Pervo (who they blame for their family’s demise), but first get him to a party and turn everyone there into zombies. Then there are a group of women from a Call Girl Service, in push-up bustiers, who are looking to kill Pervo because he owes them so much money. The problem is that the first half of the film is the set-up (which could have been done in 20 minutes rather than nearly 50), before we see any of the zombies. And most of the characters are so unlikeable, especially the overacting and incredibly badly written moronic Zander clan, that the 50 minutes feels twice as long. Maybe they could use the theme song by the Beatles: “I Don’t Want to Spoil the Party so I’ll Go…Topless.” The bigger the bust, the faster the top comes off, proportionately. There are lots of zombie attacks, but I think they’re trying to be humorous like Shaun of the Dead (2004), but the humor only occasionally clicks (though, I admit, when it does, it works). As one (of the more annoying) character enters the party room at the top of a landing and shouts, “Now, this is what I call my kind of party.” I am guessing that the writers were “borrowing” it from Austin Powers (1997)  when he says, “This is my happening baby, and it freaks me out.” You know it’s from Powers, though, because women in corsets, at one point, are called “Bots” (as in “FemBots”). But I wonder if they are aware that Austin took the line from Russ Meyer’s Beyond the Valley of the Dolls (1970, written by Roger Ebert)? So, like the difference between ThanksKilling (2009) and its sequel ThanksKilling3 (2013), the first one was okay, but the second one was not as good.
Trailer is HERE 

Review: 2LDK

Text © Richard Gary / Indie Horror Films, 2022
Images from the Internet

2LDK
Directed by Yukihiko Tsutsumi
DUEL Film Partners; Micott; Times In; Office Crescendo; Unearthed Films; MVD Entertainment
70 minutes, 2003 / 2022
www.unearthedfilms.com
www.MVDentertainment.com  

I am pretty sure when you see the title of this Japan-made release, you might be scratching your head, unless you are into real estate. It is shorthand for 2 Bedrooms, Living room, Dining room, Kitchen. And that is where the story takes place, in a Tokyo condominium. But this Blu-ray is on the Unearthed Films label, so you know things are going to get complicated and bloody within those four walls.

Eiko Kolke, Maho Nonami

Living within those rooms are two ambitious actors: there is Nozomi (Eiko Kolke) who has a history in local theater, commercials and print modeling, and redheaded Rana (Maho Nonami), a film buff who likes expensive things, and is on the verge of a breakdown. The chief contention, for the purposes of this, is that they are both up for the same part in something called “Yakuza Wives.”

Smartly presented, we see the two women’s relationships on various levels.  First, there is the almost passive aggressive quality as they are polite to each other with little, subtle digs. But here’s where it gets interesting: we also hear their inner thoughts, and neither one of them has anything nice to say about the other. They are petty and determined, and anger is simmering as both are convinced that they are the ones who will get the part.

Yet, there is another contention between the two, and that is vying for the attention of the same man, Takuya Ezaki (Daisuke Kizaki; who does all the phone voices), who is only heard on voicemail. All the onscreen time is with just the duo of Nozomi and Rana.

Things begin to ramp up pretty early as pettiness and jealousy seep ever deeper into the psyche of the two women, as well as a dose of vanity. While Nozomi is a bit of a control freak along the lines of Felix Unger (she initials all the food, both her’s and Rana’s), and Rana is a touch schizophrenic, hearing voices and seeing horrible visions of a past event. The internal rancor that we hear in their inner monologue slowly but surely start to come out in the verbal, building the tension further. And the viewer just knows it can only get worse.

And it does. Taking place all in one night, things escalate to the extreme, with household objects being used to do damage to each other, including decorative swords called Jyuttes, a fire extinguisher, a mini-chainsaw, electrocution, and lots of fisticuffs, among others.

The level of violence goes a bit beyond reality, but is mostly relentless (with some lulls for psychotic conversations or primal screams). Both are surprising in the levels to which they will go to punish the other. Of course, this makes it all the more fun for the viewer. Neither of these women are likeable though both are beautiful, at least at the start. The O. Henry-eque ending is completely fitting for the film.

The film is well shot, employing wise moves to both keep it claustrophobic and seeming like they are as far apart as their personalities. There is even a scene where our two pro-ant-agonists are sitting at a table, and as Rana talks (and Nozomi think-comments), the camera circularly swirls around the table, a style used by Tarantino a few years later in Deathproof in 2007.

Both actors in the film are well seasoned, both before and after this film. They worked extensively in cinema, but mostly appeared – often as regulars – in numerous Japanese television mini-series over the years.  This shows in their performances here, which relies a lot on the range of keeping everything inside to exploding on the outside.

There are a ton of extras on this Blu-ray, though I’m not sure how many are new and which are older. For example, there is a full-length commentary by the two actors that was recorded two years after the filming, so that would be about 2005. It is in Japanese with subtitles. It is amusing that they both snuck out from the same film shoot to come record this commentary. The two women don’t get very deep, but what is interesting is their discussions of the likeability (or lack thereof) of their characters, and almost blow-by-blow of what was happening to them as actors playing those characters as it appears on the screen. They talk about how hard a particular move was, what the cameraman was doing, their level of the flu they had caught, etc.

“The Making of 2LDK” chronicles the 8-day shoot, which was done chronologically. This is a featurette handled professionally to be used for publicity, not just cobbled-together scenes. It is shown day-by-day, and includes interviews, behind the camera scenes of table readings and the like, and is interesting throughout. For the “Duel Production Briefing” is a video of the director talking to his production crew. For festivals, there is a “Video Message for Theatre Audiences,” “Tokyo International Fantastic Film Festival Interviews,” and the “Screening at Kudan Kaikan Interviews.”

Along with a “Photo Gallery,” there is a collection of Unearthed Film trailers, including this one, and four other international releases, such as Evil Dead Trap and A Serbian Film. 

While a pretty simple storyline, the film is also a complex mixture of the physical and psychological, both focusing on Rana and Nozomi together, and individually. Rather than two trains passing in the night, they are on a single track, barreling full speed to a head-on collision. And the result is both disturbing and bloody. Right the way it should be, after all.

IMBD Listing HERE   

 

 

Review: Tokyo Decadence

Text © Richard Gary / Indie Horror Films, 2022
Images from the Internet

Tokyo Decadence (aka Topâzu; Topaz)
Directed by Ryû Murakami
Cinemabrain; Melsat; Unearthed Classics; MVD Entertainment
112 minutes, 1992 / 2022
www.unearthedfilms.com
www.MVDentertainment.com

It is hard to nail this one down when it comes to categorization. Exploitation? Sexploitation? Asian Extreme Cinema? Transgressive? Well, I guess the film has its leather boot in and on all of them.

This film is infamous, and to be honest, before this, I have never seen it, so I am looking forward to catching up. Despite a penchant for vengeful ghosts, Japan genre releases are more known for violence, gangsters, and underage women and other sexual deviances (that term conditional to the individual viewer).

There are two versions of this film: the first is the U.S.-released “soft core” 92-minute version, but this is the longer, Japanese 112-minurte “harder” one, with more sado-masochism in certain scenes (neither of them is hardcore). Needless to say, the film is in Japanese with English subtitles. The director and writer, Ryû Murakami, is no stranger to over-the-top storytelling, having written the novel upon which was the foundation of Takashi Miike’s Audition (1999). This film is also based on one of his own best-selling novels.

This Japanese production was filmed in Tokyo, at a social stratum I am certain I will never achieve in my lifetime (unless there is a full Lotto in my future).

Miho Nikaido

Right off the bat, we meet a mostly nekkid and tied down Ai (Miho Nikaido) before the credits roll. She is a high-end call girl who specializes in sado-masochistic role playing for incredibly rich men, especially on the receiving end. Her exploits are shown in very loving photography and highly erotic stylings. The first half hour is dedicated to a couple of her couplings, but one really needs to be into that kind of thing for it to be effectives, but I must admit, it’s not my style, either the humiliation, the leather, nor the domination. Artistically, I can marvel at the lighting and the way the camera is used, but the action leaves me cold and – er – unresponsive. I never really understood Japanese kink.

Despite the psycho-sexual tone of the film, the story itself moves at a glacial pace, as Ai superstitiously gets advice from a medium (Yayoi Kusama), who gives her advice such as to put telephone books under her television (like to see her try that now).

Ai starts having a change of heart about her life’s work after a few clients go just a bit too far…okay, way too far, and she begins to want to get out (somewhere in my head I hear Al Pacino saying, “But they keep pulling me back in”). While she pines for an ex-lover, a well-known man (Hiroshi Mikami) who appears on television, and is now married to a famous opera singer (Chie Sema), she is also drawn to a statuesque dominatrix drug addict, Saki (Sayoko Amano).

Sayoko Amano

The camera seems to love Nikaido and shows her emotions through extremely contrasting use of light, with people wearing mostly black and white, with the background dark and the people lit sharply. But still, she looks quite beautiful even in this harshness. There is also a sharp use of the adding of the color red, used seductively, in things like shoes, nail polish, lipstick, and especially Ai’s nearly ever-present oversized handbag to hold all her sex-toy and attire accoutrements. The shots are long, following the action with relatively few edits. The scenery is also worth mentioning, as most of the first two acts is of the city at night, with incredibly tall building with industrially florescent lighting inside the structure’s windows. It feels both organic and incredibly designed at the same time. When we do see nature, usually trees, it almost seems out of place.

Ai’s journey of dealing with rich people who need her but do not really care about her, and trying to get out of the life reminds me quite a bit of the framework of the story of Bob Fosse/Neil Simon’s Sweet Charity (1968), except it’s not a musical, other than the incidental music here is by Oscar™ winner for The Last Emperor (1987), Ryuichi Sakamoto. The music is extra helpful because Ai doesn’t really have too much dialogue, relatively speaking to most of the other characters in the film, and when she does talk, often it is almost whispered. It is like she is on a boat without oars, and she just floats in the direction the waters take her.

While I found the S&M scenes cringe-worthy, for me the most uncomfortable moments were the last act, where Ai goes looking for her ex-lover, and her further humiliation on the journey itself, even before possibly meeting him, a series of bizarreness worthy of Fellini or even Philippe de Broca’s King of Hearts (1966).

The extras for this “Blu-ray Special Edition” include an English dub version for those who have an aversion to subtitles, but know that I watched the original Japanese versions with the English subtitles turned on. I did spot check in on it here and there, and the dialogue comes close to matching the subtitles, but not quite. As a non-Japanese speaker, I really cannot say which of the two is most accurate. A “Featurette” is included from when it was first released, which is an odd mix of an extended trailer that focuses on each of the actors through clips, and interviews and pieces from the film’s opening (it looks like at a festival, but it could just be a theater and the after-party. It’s in Japanese with subtitles, but that’s no surprise, I am going to surmise. Along with a “Stills Gallery,” and a nice box slip-cover, there are trailers that include a bunch of Unearthed Classic releases, and two different versions of the one for Tokyo Decadence: from Japan and Germany.

I can certainly understand why this is considered a classic: the beautiful way it is shot, its languid style among the brutality, and the story arc, almost like an opera, but I will not be revisiting it, honestly.

IMBD Listing HERE