Asian horror

Tell Me Something

Tell Me Something (1999)

A series of hideous yet insidiously precise murders are taking place in the city and two detectives, Cho and Oh (played by Suk-kyu Han and Hang-Seon Jang, respectively) are on the case. The clues lead them to a lovely artist named Chae (Eun-ha Shim), who was romantically involved with all of the victims. She tells them about Ki-yeon (Jun-Sang Yu), her possessive ex, who happens to be a surgeon and has the medical knowledge to pull off the crimes.

Of course, things aren’t so simple. Detective Cho, the younger of the two cops, is a mess. Internal affairs has been after his ass for years over some screw-up from his past. And he can’t resist the morose charms of Chae, the poster child for damaged goods. Will he be able to keep his head (both of them) on straight and solve this case before anyone else ends up sliced and diced and on display for the world to see?

I first heard about this film (directed by Youn-hyun Chang) while reading an old Videoscope magazine and it sounded intriguing. Tell Me Something is a gruesome little thriller with some giallo influence for sure. The acting from all involved is very good. My only complaints are that the film is wee bit pretentious (though it is earned for the most part), the pacing lags a bit towards the end, and the score is pretty dated. But even with those minor quibbles, I’m glad I checked this one out. There is a lot of tension, ghastly gore setpieces, and the atmosphere is gritty and full of dread. Recommended despite its minor flaws.

The Queen of Black Magic

The Queen of Black Magic (1979)

A wedding party falls under a black magic curse. The bride has horrific visions and the entire ceremony is in shambles. The groom, Kohar, took Murni’s virginity and then spurned her for his new woman. Now he accuses her of casting the curse upon his fiancé. Kohar encourages the villagers to capture Murni, set her mother on fire, and then throw her off a cliff. She is rescued from death by a witch doctor who teaches her the arts of black magic. Murni uses her newfound abilities to get vengeance on Kohar and the people who tried to destroy her.

Obviously not big on women’s lib, Murni (played by the lovely Suzzanna) is first manipulated by the man she loves and then becomes a pawn of the evil sorcerer. Thankfully, Kohar, the unrepentant prick gets what he deserves. Permana, the holy man, comes preaching that prayer is the best defense against black magic and he’s right. The ignorance of the villagers and their refusal to pray will spell out their doom.

The Queen of Black Magic has excellent direction and pacing. The movie flies by as we are treated to one wild scene after another. Somebody please, buy me this soundtrack! The score for The Queen of Black Magic is some wild synthesizer action mixed with a killer string section and awesome percussion. It’s freakin’ great!

The gore effects are simple but gruesome with some wicked splatter moments. One evil bastard is killed when giant blood-filled boils appear on his body and burst all over the place. Another choice scene comes when someone rips his own head off. The head starts flying around and bites a strip of flesh off the leader of the village.

This was my first foray into Indonesian horror and it will not be the last. The story reminded me of a 70s Shaw Brothers gore flick but more conservative like an Indian horror film (just without the musical numbers). Other than the crazy gore and Murni’s wacky training montage, the most outlandish aspect of The Queen of Black Magic is a totally unnecessary melodramatic twist at the end that just makes the story a little more confusing and a little more strange. Overall, this is a fun flick that folks with a taste for international horror will go bonkers over. Highly recommended!

“All men are traitors!”

Baptism of Blood

Baptism of Blood (1996)

Beautiful film actress Matsuko Uehara (Risa Akikawa) goes into hiding after she develops a disfiguring skin disease. She and Dr. Edmond Meredith (Tatsuya Go) plan to use his brain transplant machine to give her a younger body. Fifteen years later, they finally have the perfect specimen: Matsuko’s teenage daughter Sakura (played by Rie Imamura). As if Sakura didn’t have enough problems what with her lecherous piano teacher, Masahiko (Chihiro Tago), she now has to deal with her mom’s body-snatching? Geez!

Kenichi Yoshihara directs Baptism of Blood, a film that is proof that sometimes things are obscure for a reason and your directorial debut can also be your swan song. Okay, maybe I’m being a little hasty here. Yoshihara hasn’t made a film in 21 years but after this one, I have to say he’s probably done. Anyway… What Baptism of Blood lacks in plot, acting, and pacing, it (nearly) makes up for in all out kookiness. The film sports a low budget (except where gore effects are involved) and ultra-minimal sets that actually work in its favor.

There are these weird moments when the planets align and this film actually kicks out the jams for a moment or two. The scene where Sakura (with Matsuko’s brain in her body) threatens Kazuyo’s baby carriage (with her baby inside it!) with a minivan is amazing. There’s also a beautiful bitch-slap session when Matsuko pummels one of Sakura’s friends for accidentally scratching her perfect face. Reverse Oscar for everyone involved! Do they make Academy Award statues sitting on a little gold toilet? Boy, I’d love to hand those bastards out!

If you have an unequivocal love of Japanese horror films then Baptism of Blood will either stretch it to the breaking point or kill it completely. You will be as astounded by the absence of an even remotely mediocre ending as you will by the audaciousness of the phallicized brain switching machine. So that’s where the money went! Straight to the big black penis apparatus! Thank you, thesaurus.

Oh, if only the plot have held out we might have a minor bad classic on our hands. The film is quite kinky and sometimes just plain wrong. The whole thing with 15 year old Sakura (with Matsuko’s brain in her body!) sleeping with her piano teacher… No comment. The clunkiness of the script, the not-so-subtle perverse themes, the unintentional hilarity, and some nasty gore scenes make this an interesting viewing experience to say the least. I’m going to go out on a limb here and actually say that I actually really like this one but please, please understand how terrible this is before you muster up the courage to face the misleadingly titled Baptism of Blood.

Ghost Ballroom

Ghost Ballroom (1989)

Okay, let me try and do this as painlessly as possible. Mei is a prostitute junkie who owes her employer and lover, Master Condon, a great deal of money. Condon and his cronies throw her out of her apartment window and she dies. When she shows up and starts making some serious supernatural trouble for her killers, Condon hires a monk to get rid of Mei’s spirit. Knowing that she can’t do it alone, Mei approaches her living friends to help her gain the strength to take her revenge on Condon.

The kooky circus/pop opening credit music should have been enough to tip me off to what I was in for when Netflix sent me Ghost Ballroom. The plot is as dumb as a bag of rocks and the tone is all over the place. Director Wilson Tong tries to blend gritty urban drama, comedy, horror, kung-fu, and magic in one film and he almost pulls it off. The biggest problem is that Ghost Ballroom is so spastic that it never develops any of its characters. There is no main character to follow. Instead of 2 or 3 leads, this film has 5 or 6 main people who are never painted in anything more than a superficial light. All of the characters are hookers, drug dealers, gamblers, gangsters, junkies, etc. so it’s kind of tough to find anyone to relate to.

Where Ghost Ballroom does succeed is in its energy. Once it gets going, the pace never lets up. For the benefit of the Western viewer, there are multiple moments lost in translation that are worth a laugh or two. There are also some genuinely funny parts (some clever, some straight out of the gutter) but the tone problems I mentioned make it difficult to really enjoy them. The horror and magic sequences are cool enough but are usually pretty weak and the sleazy sex is kept to a minimum as well. Had director Tong pushed the envelope in either direction, this film might make a little more sense, entertainmentally (is that a real word?) speaking. It’s not the worst I’ve seen from that wild planet called Hong Kong but it certainly could have been much, much better.

Jigoku

Jigoku (1960)

[Some spoilers ahead.]

Shiro Shimizu (played by Shigeru Amachi) has got some real problems. While hanging out with his “friend” Tamura (Yoichi Numata) one night, he takes part in the hit and run of a gangster. This gangster’s mother (Kiyoko Tsuji) witnesses the crime and vows her revenge on both Tamura and Shiro (even though he wasn’t driving) with the aid of her son’s girlfriend Yoko (Akiko Ono). As if this weren’t bad enough, Shiro’s fiancée Yokiko (Utako Mitsuya) is killed in a taxi accident the night she was going to tell him something very important. While falling into Yoko and the gangster’s mom’s trap and shunned by his future in-laws, Shiro gets a letter from home that his mother is dying.

While his mother (played by Kimi Tokudaiji) lay dying in a cheap and corrupt rest home, Shiro’s father (Hiroshi Hayashi) is living in the next room with his mistress. Shiro meets Sachiko (Akiko Ono again), a girl who reminds him an awful lot of his dead fiancée and who he immediately has a crush on. She lives at the rest home with her drunken artist father who sells his paintings of hell to get by. Tamura shows up in town to cause more trouble for Shiro as does Yoko and the gangster’s mom. Someone serves some bad fish at the rest home’s tenth anniversary (plus there’s a bottle of poison sake going around) and next thing you know, pretty much every single character we’ve met up to this point goes straight to freakin’ hell.

But wait, there’s more! Now in hell, Shiro discovers some disturbing revelations about his family and is forced to face all of his earthly sins. Oh and Enma, the king of hell, is going to get his money’s worth torturing him for all eternity. In the underworld, Yoko reveals to Shiro that she was going to tell him she was pregnant the night she died and that their unborn child is trapped somewhere in hell. Our whiny miserable “hero” decides to get his shit together and go rescue their child so that she won’t suffer along with all the lost souls who totally deserve to be there. But will this young man’s will be enough to challenge the will of the king of hell? Wait, why is Sachiko in hell? She’s a nice girl? Oh man, why is there a river of pus and excrement? That’s just nasty! These questions and many more are answered in Jigoku!

What’s the most fun you could ever have going to hell? With legendary wacko director Nobuo Nakagawa’s 1960 film, Jigoku, you silly! The cacophonous and sensual opening credit sequence alone is enough to make this one of the strangest film about H-E-double hockey sticks. Jigoku is as much about the tortures of hell as it is about guilt and what spectacular failures human beings are. There’s also melodrama so overwrought and irony so ironic it’s almost too ironic for me to even be talking about it. Either way, I bet you haven’t seen anything quite like this before.

I’ve rarely enjoyed a movie that was this hard to sit through. Its two sections, the earthly plane and the world of hell, are both filled with agony and misery. The second half just has more screaming. The feeling of dread is excruciating as everything just keeps spinning out of control. Lives are wrecked and people just keep making stupid ass choices that land their butts on the griddle. The tortures awaiting them, though cheesily staged, are brutal. There’s a demon whose job it is to smash yer dang teeth in. Hey, it’s a living! The compositions by cinematographer Mamoru Morita are striking and the film’s wild score by the prolific Michiaki Watanbe is simply mind-blowing.

All of the actors are totally devoted to this piece of insanity. You know you’ve got an excellent cast when the viewer is willing to die and go to hell with them. And it takes a great actor to make an unpleasant character into a fascinating portrait and that is just what Shigeru Amachi does with Shiro. The funniest aspect of this character is how he is a magnet for women. Yukiko, Yoko, Sachiko, and even his father’s mistress, all go for this friggin’ guy.

However, for me, the shining star of Jigoku is Yoichi Numata (of Ringu). I think it was around the second time that Tamura materialized out of thin air that I realized this character had a little more up his sleeve than just a sleazy prankster. It is quite clear that this roguish gentleman is a catalyst for a sin, a mad soul from hell on an unholy mission, a total dickweed trying to make everyone suffer as much as he, etc. Numata’s performance is wildly over-the-top, spastic, and totally perfect.

Is Jigoku a classic film? Oh yeah. Is it also shrill as hell (really, duder, like “hell”?) and a little (read as: a lot) exasperating during some of its running time? Mm-hm. It’s a fairly obvious art movie that is trying to hide behind its tawdry tapestry of misery and horror. I urge you to watch this film as soon as you can but I must warn you: You will go to hell and your screams of perpetual torment will go unnoticed in the chaotic din of eternity. Bring your friends! Jigoku is a great date movie as well. But you’re not getting laid after it’s over.

Nightmare Zone

Nightmare Zone (1998)

This trilogy of horror stories begins when May Ho (Emily Kwan) becomes bored and calls her family’s old phone number only to find herself on the other line. In the next story, Mr. Tin (Lai Yiu Cheung) and his wife, Lily (Cheung Yuen Man), are just trying to get by in their failing marriage and squalid apartment. Tin’s urge to murder innocent people after they even slightly offend him and Lily’s need to carry a meat cleaver around with her at all times don’t help matters much. Lastly, Simon Chu (Max Mok) is haunted by dreams of the past and finds that the only one who can help him is the con artist, Feng Chin (Yvonne Yung).

I can’t even say “Nightmare Zone” without screaming, falling to my knees, and shaking my fists at the sky. Director Yuk Jan Lee’s horrifyingly bland and terrifyingly lame Nightmare Zone runs less than 90 minutes but feels just under 90 years long. Come to think of it, other than some stylish (yet very brief) moments in the cinematography department and amusing flubs in the subtitles (“Yeah, human is never up to the Heaven.”), there is nothing even remotely valuable about watching this picture. Well? Hold on, maybe I can come up with something.

The first story is filmed very nicely in a moody blue hue. Unfortunately, the script is gray and tan paisley. The unluckily named, May Ho (played by Emily Kwan of The Untold Story and Dr. Lamb), goes goth while feeling lonely without her boyfriend around (codependent!). Pretty sad to watch someone bottoming out in Hong Kong because she called herself and herself answered the phone. Confused? You won’t be but you’ll wish you were. May’s whipped boyfriend, Chi On, is sufficiently dreamy but man, get a life. The finale at the “Tin Tin Building” couldn’t come any sooner with an open or closed ending that hurts if I think about it too much. Not a good way to start the trilogy.

The best story of the three (and that isn’t saying much) is up next. The story of Mr. Tin (Lai Yui Cheung of The Stewardess) and his crazy wife has the plot of a Cat III flick but none of the extreme sex and violence. This is a damn shame since the best performances in Nightmare Zone are wasted on a tame and bloodless storyline. Other than a couple of quick murder scenes and some implied cannibalism, we’re left with a quick and unsatisfying ending to a decent story.

They saved the best for the last if you happen to hate entertainment. The gorgeous Yvonne Yung (Chinese Torture Chamber) plays Feng Chin, a fake psychic who cheats people out of their hard earned money. It’s amazing to watch such a beautiful woman playing a money-grubbing scumbag like this. Poor Simon Chu (Max Mok of Ghost Fever), he has to follow this biznitch around and try to find the answer to his dreams. Hell of a hobby. The ending will simply not stop taking its sweet time wrapping up and pretty soon the whole thing just induces giggles and eye-gouging.

If you feel you have to see every Asian horror movie ever made then put this one at the top of your list so you can get it over with quickly. Nightmare Zone gives all Hong Kong horror movies a bad name just by its very existence. I keep trying to figure out why I have watched this one twice when twice is three times too many. That’s it, screw this, I’m going out to have some “monkey affairs” of my own, whatever that means.

Organ

Organ (1996)

Numata and his partner Tosaka go undercover to catch a ring of black market organ dealers. Things go wrong and Numata is forced to abandon Tosaka who is taken hostage by Jun, the doctor who performed the organ removals. Numata is thrown off the police force but continues to search for his partner even though he is believed to be dead. Shinji, Tosaka’s brother, is also unconvinced of his brother’s demise and searches on his own.

Meanwhile, Jun has returned to his day job of a science teacher in a high school. He has cut off all of Tosaka’s limbs and keeps him in a closet in his office. Yoko (Kei Fujiwara), Jun’s sister and leader of the organ stealing ring, brings her brother drugs to help him ease the pain of a horrible infection growing on his stomach. As Numata and Shinji get closer to finding Jun and Yoko, things begin to go wrong for everyone. The yakuza want control over the organ stealing ring and Yoko will fight to the death to protect her and her brother’s interests. Everything comes to a head when Shinji runs afoul with the yakuza and Yoko while Numata finds where Jun has been hiding.

This weird and often confusing film is bloodier, gorier, and funkier than even its title suggests. Kei Fujiwara (who played the woman in Tetsuo – The Iron Man) directs and stars in a film soaked with putrescence and populated with sleazy and violent characters. The dominant theme of Organ is the obsession and repulsion with the physical form and it is explored thoroughly. There’s even room for a not so subtle addiction motif.

The performances are mixed but most of the cast serves the weirdness of the film quite well. Some characters wander around like zombies while others are one-sided seedy caricatures. Fujiwara is great as the one-eyed, organ stealing, and yakuza slaying, Yoko, who unfortunately, doesn’t get nearly enough screentime. Unfortunately, the pace of Organ is frustratingly slow in places resting too much on its artsy laurels. Not that the film isn’t effectively moody or tense but the slow spots are many. It’s hard not to imagine how much this would benefit from tighter editing. Another problem is that the film introduces too many characters and it’s easy to get confused.

The effects are gruesome and squirm inducing. The rotting flesh and the pus should be enough to keep any gorehound happy throughout the running time. There are also some insanely bloody moments guaranteed to please. The scene where Yoko is blinded in one eye and Jun is nearly castrated by their psychotic mother is particularly brutal, especially since the characters are children when this takes place. Organ will not be every viewer’s cup of tea. Even fans of extreme Asian cinema may be put out by the slow pace and the artiness of the proceedings. However, this is a prime example of oozing, dripping, and pus-soaked Japanese horror with absolutely no light at the end of the tunnel.

Kibakichi 2

kibakichi2

Kibakichi 2 (2004)

Sakuramaru (Masakatsu Funaki), a renegade samurai, is cutting his way through the countryside and anyone who stands in his way. He is more than happy to cross paths with Kibakichi (Ryuuji Harada) because he has finally found a worthy opponent. Anju (Miki Tanka), another werewolf samurai, interrupts their battle by trying to kill Kibakichi herself in order to get revenge for her monster family. Kibakichi is injured and is cared for by a young blind woman named Tokoko (Aimi Nakajima) in a nearby village. A new threat emerges when three monsters decide to take over and all concerned parties are dragged into yet another Yokai war.

Kibakichi 2 opens promisingly enough with Sakuramaru cutting down an entire city with his sword but before long, the film slows to a crawl. There is plenty of swordplay and some monster action (needs more please) but the spark is definitely gone this time around. A melodramatic departure is always welcome (that’s just me) but not one as flat as the one here. The pacing of this film is terrible making the 80 minute running time feel like several hours. There are too many cheap shortcuts in the effects department that really stand out. There are fewer monsters in Kibakichi 2 than in the first film so the rubbery masks stick out even worse. Samurais attack with mouths full of fake blood, are cut down, and then spray their bloody spittle into the air.

The returning cast (Ryuuji Harada and Miki Tanaka) seems bored with the material but some of the new faces are up for the task. Masakatsu Funaki (Godzilla: Final Wars) is great as the Sakuramaru, the bloodthirsty berserker swordsman. Aimi Nakajima is also good as the sweet (and very cute) Tokoko who gets caught up in all the intrigue. As for Ryuuji Harada (Izo, Pyrokinesis), he takes the already stoic character of Kibakichi and makes him into a sleepwalker through much of the film. Miki Tanaka plays Anju as though she was constipated and just can’t seem to get into the battle scenes.

Kibakichi 2 is a big disappointment after the unbridled insanity of the first film. Not to say that Kibakichi 2 is your average flick. Oh no. Anyone who watches the samurai werewolf ballet sequence at the film’s climax won’t believe for a second that there is anyone even remotely normal behind the camera. Speaking of the samurai werewolf ballet, this is one of the weirdest and most endearingly pathetic filmic disasters I’ve ever seen. While witnessing this spectacle I felt was teetering on edge of madness. In fact, this scene is probably the only reason to sit through this movie. I just don’t know anymore.

I hate to compare a sequel to its predecessor this blatantly but while looking for, at best, a good companion piece or, at worst, an entertaining diversion, I found neither. Kibakichi 2 is brought down by its molasses pacing, sleepy cast, and restraint of the craziness that made the first film so much fun. Who knows what happened between the two films but my only hope now is that there won’t be a third.

Kibakichi

kibakichi

Kibakichi (2004)

Ryuji Harada plays Kibakichi, a swordsman and werewolf who is constantly under attack by bounty hunters while traveling through the countryside to escape his past. Kibakichi discovers a village of Yokai, monsters like himself that have assumed the personas of human beings in order to survive. The Yokai are working on a deal with the yakuza to give them a place to lead their lives as they want to. Kibakichi warns the Yokai not to trust humans and just as he is about to leave, the yakuza, led by Yomaji (Mubu Nakayama), betray the Yokai and launch a violent assault on their village. Caught in the crossfire, Kubakichi uses his superior sword-fighting skills and his powers as a Yokai to defend his kind.

Director Tomoo Haraguchi brings this wild and explosive horror fantasy film to life. Kibakichi superbly combines traditional Japanese monsters with action movie bravado resulting in a jaw dropping experience. The choreography in the sword fighting scenes and the stunt work in the film’s finale are excellent.

The special effects are simplistic but ambitious. The Yokai, taken straight from Japanese lore, look great and there is plenty of blood and gore (both red and blue) spilled throughout. Various filters are used to dowse the film in gorgeous earth tones, giving Kibakichi its own unique and proto-classic look.

The streamlined plot revels in its traditional “lone swordsman” storyline but removes all traces of subtlety to keep in step with the director’s crowd-pleasing style. The action just keeps on coming rarely slowing to allow any audience to lose interest. Even the film’s message is trite: human beings ruin everything.

The actors in Kibakichi perform with a very representational acting style making the film feel like a bizarre theatrical production. This style complements the film’s script, which is laden with melodrama and moments meant to tug on the viewer’s heartstrings. Ryuji Harada is perfect as the stone-faced and deadly Kibakichi.

Kibakichi is one hell of an ambitious and truly weird film. It breaks all the rules of its multiple genres (just check out the yakuza’s arsenal) and yet still captures the conventions that make samurai films so memorable. Most viewers will find it difficult not to be blown away by the sheer bombastic audacity of the film’s climax. Followed by a crappy sequel.

The Last Supper

lastsupper

The Last Supper (2005)

Dr. Yuji Kotorida (Masaya Kato) is a ‘Godsend’ of plastic surgery. He is well-respected by both the medical community and the media but what no one knows is that he is a vicious and cannibalistic serial killer. In an anonymous blog, Dr. Kotorida describes the act of eating human flesh as the equivalent of making love. When his horrible secret is discovered by an insane detective (Hiroki Matsukata), Kotorida devises a plan to make himself famous as well as to escape from the police.

Finally, cannibalism is sexy again! Directed by Osamu Fukutani (The Suicide Manual), The Last Supper sports a menacing soundtrack and a somber (and sometimes chilling) mood. This shot-on-video cannibal horror flick may look cheap but it got my stomach churning (not an easy thing to do). The plot doesn’t get too bogged down in ‘realism’ like some of the CAT III Hong Kong gross-out flicks (Human Pork Chop, in particular).

The cast of The Last Supper may be somewhat stiff but all in all manage to turn in some decent performances. Horror actress Hitomi Miwa (Ju-On, Embalming) is excellent and I really liked newcomer Hibiki Takumi. Chinese actress Zuki Lee is quite good as Dr. Kotorida’s Hong Kong fling (and meal). Of course, it’s Masaya Kato’s show and he definitely goes the distance in one hell of a sick role. The award for the strangest performance in the film goes to Hiroki Matsukata (The Yakuza Papers). His detective character is one sick (very, very sick) bastard.

The only thing that keeps this movie from being a splatter cannibal classic is its low production values. Cheap sets and digital photography are perfectly acceptable for this trash film lover but when you skimp on the gore effects, now that’s an entirely different story. The severed heads suffer the most and are clearly mannequin heads with wigs tacked on. Also, the film’s fleshy finale isn’t exactly impressive but hey, the effort is there.

So my theories about cannibal nightclubs in Hong Kong have proven to be true. The idea that devouring a person’s flesh is a sexual act really sleazes up this one. Some of the flesh-eating is pretty dang gross (wait, when isn’t it?) and there’s a whole lot of blood and bargain-priced gore. The Last Supper is somewhat disappointing but a few nauseous and shocking surprises make it a worthy entry in the cannibal movie canon.