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Japanese cinema

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Blu-ray Review: The Daimajin Trilogy (1966)

A giant samurai statue goes a-rompin’ and a-stompin’ in The Daimajin Trilogy, a new box-set release covering Daiei’s classic kaiju creation courtesy of the sexy devils over at Arrow Video (along with MVD Entertainment)! First up comes 1966’s Daimajin: In medieval Japan, peasants cower in fear as the Earth trembles. These rustic folk believe that this is the result of a giant imprisoned within a nearby mountain attempting to make a jailbreak somewhere in this town (they are right btw)… As that is going on, the samurai lord of the village falls victim to samurai treachery, which causes his children to flee deep into the wicked woods that surround the village. They soon find themselves at the shrine of that aforementioned giant, the god Daimajin (played to perfection by Chikara “Riki” Hashimoto who would essay the role for the entire series); a huge-ass solid stone samurai that proves that in this particular village a hard man is indeed good to

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DanXIII

Aug 22, 2021

ForeignMoviesReviewsThriller

Blu-ray Review: Blind Beast (1969)

Michio (Eiji Funakoshi) is your typical artist; he lives with his mother, is blind, and lives in a bizarre studio filled with a surreal tableau containing titanic sculptures devoted to the senses… and tits n’ ass… lord the gigantic tits n’ ass that studio-space contains… He’s also not above kidnapping a mother fucker outright if kids thinks she’s hot… That is exactly what he does to beautiful model Aki (Mako Midori), who is naturally really not that into it… and promptly attempts to escape, which you’d think would be easy given that her captor, I don’t know… can’t fucking see her and all… but, alas she fails… more than once… Before you can say Stockholm syndrome, Aki begins to really dig on the sadomasochistic shenanigans ol’ Michio is laying down… so much so that she begins to take things even further. Fondling of statue ass ensues. Comprised of a darkly sexual tone (while not being overly graphic… for the most

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DanXIII

Aug 20, 2021

ForeignMoviesReviewsThriller

Blu-ray Review: Irezumi (1966)

Otsuya (Ayako Wakao) has it all, being the daughter of a well-off merchant type back in the days of yore down Japan-way. Not content to live a life on Easy Street, Otsuya falls head over ass for one of her father’s employees (read dirt-poor bastard), Shinsuke ( Akio Hasegawa) to be precise. Anyway, the dynamic duo decide to beat feet and elope, because you can bet demons to diamonds that Daddy Dearest would never approve of that bit of bad romance. Speaking of “bad”, that whole eloping idea was right shit and long story short; Otsuya ends up a prostitute who’s fortune gets even more like a puddle of puke when she meets a shady-as-fuck master tattooist who decides Otsuya’s ivory-white skin would make one hell of a canvas for his latest work; a big-ass monster spider with a human face, and right on her back that shit goes. Along with her new ink comes the ire of nearly fuckin’

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DanXIII

Jun 12, 2021

ForeignMoviesReviewsThriller

Blu-ray Review: The Invisible Man Appears (1949)/The Invisible Man Vs. The Human Fly (1957)

New (as of 1949) from Daiei; the studio that made YOU believe a turtle can fly comes: The Invisible Man Appears, one of the earliest tokusatsu efforts that would go on to be a huge cornerstone of Japanese cinema and TV! Ol’ Doc Nakazato has invented himself a way to make living things invisible down Japan way. Well wouldn’t ya just know that a gaggle of no-good jewel thieves get wind of the discovery and put a kidnap on Nakazato lickety-split so they can use his science to make their pockets fatter with zero the risk normally associated with such deviltry. Soon a real Claude Rains 1933 type (read bandages and sunglasses) shows up in Kobe and goes on a crime spree, but of course once those bandages are off there’s no trace of the criminal responsible for the dirty deeds! The real question is, will John Q. Law (aided by Ryûko Mizuki; a stylish, highly androgynous nightclub performer played

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DanXIII

Apr 18, 2021

ForeignMoviesReviews

Blu-ray Review: Shogun’s Joy of Torture (1968)

Presented as an anthology piece, 1968’s Shogun’s Joy of Torture is comprised of three torture tales that I’ll dive into directly! Story one concerns Shinza; a working man who takes a log to the head, and thanks to this being ye olden days where health insurance was as non-existent, winds up shit out of luck and unable to get that shit looked at properly. Enter: Shinza’s sis Mitsu, a loverly lass who tries to appeal to Shinza’s boss, Mino, for a lil’ financial assistance and gets raped for her trouble. As if that didn’t put us square in the “family fun zone”, Shinza is also hot n’ horny for his sister (a decidedly different “family fun zone”), which that ass-hat Mino finds out about and begins a game to make Mitsu eternally his. Okay, story numero deuce should be a bit more cheery… Young nun Reiho arrives at a convent located right next door to a monastery… seriously, what’s the

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DanXIII

Feb 21, 2021

ForeignMoviesReviews

Blu-ray Review: Versus (2000)

Two escaped prisoners make their way through the woods, and soon meet up with a gang of over-the-top Yakuza and the woman they have kidnapped. Unbeknownst to them, the forest is home to the 444th portal to hell (the Portal of Resurrection to be precise), but the learn soon enough as a slight misunderstanding leads to some bodies hittin’ the floor… but they sure as shit don’t stay there! Prisoner KSC2-303 (Tak Sakaguchi) and The Girl (Chieko Misaka) escape the initial zombie fracas and flee deeper into those wicked woods but soon that verdant landscape is lousy with the walking dead, and escape may be impossible for our heroes and their gangster pursuers (not mention their occult-minded boss and the assassins he employs)! I’m not going to lie to you cats n’ creeps, Versus is a straight up mother fucking masterpiece! Ryûhei Kitamura (along with co-writer Yudai Yamaguchi) created the “all killer, no filler” (a real miracle considering this film

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DanXIII

Jan 10, 2021

ForeignIndieMoviesReviews

Blu-ray Review: Burst City (1982)

The plot, as very, very loose as it is to Gakuryû Ishii’s (aka Sogo Ishii) Burst City goes kinda/sorta as follows: In a dystopian Japan, gangs of punk rockers put on large concerts (conveyed via music video style vignettes), fight each other for stage time, and form their own dominant, completely out-of-control culture. This of course goes over like a fart in church to the local gangsters who plan on making the city, or more properly the land it sits on, their own. Rioting, rock, racing, and hard fucking (it’s not an “R” word, but it’s in there) ensue! Oh, and before I forget there are also a draconian police force (the Battle Police), a work force comprised of violent heavily armored Road Warrior-style bastards (some mutated, all insane), and plenty of piss n’ puke! Unconcerned with traditional narrative structure, Ishii throws as much light, sound, movement and pure adrenaline on screen as humanly possible… and when the film does

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DanXIII

Dec 1, 2020

ForeignMovies

Blu-ray Review: The Bloodthirsty Trilogy (1970 – 1974)

No doubt inspired by the success of Hammer Film’s Dracula series, as well as the popularity of the Gothic soap opera Dark Shadows, Japanese movie maestros Toho (of Godzilla fame) decided to get in on the vein drain biz, the result of which are the three film’s I’ll be turning my eerie eyeballs on today! The Vampire Doll (1970): On your standard dark and stormy night, Sagawa (Atsuo Nakamura) returns from abroad and heads to the home of his fiance Yuko Nonomura (Yukiko Kobayashi)…a home that would give Barnabas Collins the fucking creeps no less (at times realized with a fantastic miniature in exterior scenes). Once there, Yuko’s mother; the ultra eerie Shidu (Yôko Minakaze) informs Sagawa his love has died. He opts to spend the night and of course has nightmare visions of his lost love…visions that are soon revealed to be reality resulting in Sagawa’s disappearance. Enter Sagawa’s sister Keiko (Kayo Matsuo) and her fiance Hiroshi (Akira Nakao)

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DanXIII

Jun 11, 2018

Japanese cinema

More from Japanese cinema