Pastoral - To Die in the Country (1974)

Pastoral: To Die in the Country (Japanese: 田園に死す, Hepburn: Den-en ni shisu; lit. 'To Die in the Countryside'), also known as Pastoral Hide and Seek (French: Cache-cache pastoral), is a 1974 Japanese experimental surrealist film written and directed by Shūji Terayama. Adapted from Terayama's 1965 tanka poetry collection and a 1962 television drama he scripted—both sharing the film's Japanese title—the film stars Kantarō Suga, Hiroyuki Takano [ja], Kaoru Yachigusa, and Isao Kimura. Employing a film-within-a-film structure, it depicts an adult director (Suga)—a stand-in for Terayama—who encounters resistance from his younger self (Takano) as he attempts to complete a cinematic reimagining of his rural adolescence.

Phantom (1975)

Toshio Matsumoto depicts an unreal world created by piecing together fragments of fantasies and delusions seen by a single woman. The mysterious color tones, which are far removed from the actual sense of color, are due to the use of color infrared film.

"Himiko" (卑弥呼) 1974

Himiko (Japanese: 卑弥呼) is a 1974 bizarre Japanese fantasy drama film directed by Masahiro Shinoda. It was entered into the 1974 Cannes Film Festival Feature Film Competition.

The story follows the myth of the Sun Goddess, Himiko, who is the earliest Japanese historical figure documented in Japanese, Chinese, and Korean history, although her existence, identity, and location have been the source of endless debate.

Nevertheless, the consensus talks about a queen-shaman who was ruling Yamatai, the Kingdom of the Sun before Japan became a specific, separate entity.

In the film, she is a shaman who speaks for the Sun God, being revered in the society she lives in but also constrained by the will of her people for her to be a sacred entity. As the story begins, she finds herself in the middle of political turmoil regarding the succession of King Ohkimi, who is actually the true decision-maker in the kingdom, despite Himiko's role.

Ohkimi plans to have Mimaki as his heir, but his younger brother, Ikume also wants the throne, while priest Nashime prefers Himiko to be the ruler.

The tension in the film escalates when Takehiko, Himiko's half brother, returns after his world travels. Himiko, the shaman, finds herself falling in love with him, adding a layer of emotional conflict to the narrative.

However, Takehiko seems to have feelings for Adahime, a woman who assists Himiko in her various rituals.

As the story unfolds, the antagonism between the Kingdom of the Sun, the Kingdom of the Land, and The Kingdom of the Mountains also reaches a boiling point, further heightening the emotional stakes.

Here is the full-length film with English subtitles

Summer Storm - Tatsumi Hijikata (1973)

“A Summer Storm by Hijikata Tatsumi” primarily consists of the legendary Japanese dancer Hijikata Tatsumi's legendary performance shot in Kyoto in 1973, and is a tribute to this extraordinary talent. Now, thirty years later, it is still funny, sad, and infinitely gripping. Hijikata was the pioneer of the reputed Butoh dance. Butoh, performed in slow, unique movements by dancers, with their bodies painted white and bent-forward, is an antithesis of the traditional Western dance. As the only remaining footage in color of his performance, the film shows Hijikata as an eternal punker, rebel, and sufferer.

Atman (1975)

 

An experimental short film by Toshio Matsumoto.

The film depicts a figure sitting in an outdoor environment and wearing a robe and a Hannya mask. The film features receding and shifting images captured in a frame-by-frame manner; though these shots resemble zooms and pans, they were actually derived from positioning the camera on a series of a points.

Atman is a visual tour-de-force built on the idea of a subject fixed at the center of a circle created by 480 camera positions. Filmed frame by frame, the sequence accelerates into an increasingly rapid circular motion, turning stillness into disorienting rhythm.

The seated figure wears the devil mask of Hangan from Noh theater, accompanied by Noh music and the principle of acceleration often tied to Noh drama. The title itself, Atman is a Sanskrit term for "self," sometimes linked to destruction, infuses the film with spiritual unease.

What begins as meditation collapses into disintegration: a hypnotic, unsettling ritual where cinema dismantles identity through repetition, motion, and the terror of looking too long.

964 Pinocchio

 

964 Pinocchio (1991) is a cyberpunk body horror film directed by Shōzin Fukui. The film tells the story of a memory wiped cyborg slave who after being discarded by his owners, wanders through an urban wasteland and meets a homeless woman suffering from memory loss and together they descend into a hallucinatory nightmare of identity, control, and transformation.

Fukui's film is a visceral assault on the senses, blending surreal imagery, kinetic handheld camerawork, and industrial noise into a fever dream of dehumanization and decay.

964 Pinocchio stands as a cult landmark of Japanese cyberpunk cinema, exploring the collapse of the body and mind in a dystopian, post-industrial world. It is widely considered as one of the best examples of the underground Japanese Cyberpunk genre.

House [Hausu] 1977 with subs

House (Japanese: ハウス, Hepburn: Hausu) is a 1977 Japanese comedy horror film directed and produced by Nobuhiko Obayashi. It is about a schoolgirl traveling with her six friends to her ailing aunt's country home, where they come face to face with supernatural events as the girls are, one by one, devoured by the home. It stars mostly amateur actors, with only Kimiko Ikegami and Yōko Minamida having any notable previous acting experience. The musical score was performed by the rock band Godiego.

In Tokyo, a teenage girl known as Gorgeous, so called for her beauty, has plans for a summer vacation with her widowed father, a wealthy film composer who has been away in Italy on business. When he returns home, he surprises Gorgeous by announcing he has married a woman named Ryoko Ema. Distraught, Gorgeous goes to her bedroom and writes a letter to her aunt, asking if she can visit her for the summer instead. Her aunt replies and allows her to come. Gorgeous invites her six friends: Prof, who is highly academic and very good at problem-solving; Melody, who has an affinity for music; Kung Fu, who is athletic and especially skilled at kung fu; Mac, who has a big appetite; Sweet, who is bubbly and gentle; and Fantasy, who is a constant daydreamer.

House is a deeply psychedelic suspense thriller. In watching it we enter a confined and childlike world of psychological terror. The seven girls who feature in the film are aspects of a single personality, moving back through memories and trauma. Far Out described it as "a psychedelic trip like no other, featuring a flurry of animation, surreal violence and enigmatic Japanese energy [...] Obayashi suffuses his world with a mix of vivid hand-drawn animation and surreal cinematic choices to take the viewer on a dance of phantasmagorical absurdity."

Funeral Parade of Roses (1969)

Funeral Parade of Roses (薔薇の葬列, Bara no Sōretsu) is a 1969 Japanese drama art film directed and written by Toshio Matsumoto, loosely adapted from Oedipus Rex and set in the underground gay culture of 1960s Tokyo. It stars Peter as the protagonist, a young transgender woman, and features Osamu Ogasawara, Yoshio Tsuchiya and Emiko Azuma. A product of the Japanese New Wave, the film combines elements of arthouse, documentary and experimental cinema, and is thought to have influenced Stanley Kubrick's 1971 film adaptation of Anthony Burgess' novel A Clockwork Orange (although many of the points of comparison can also be found in earlier movies such as Rainer Werner Fassbinder's Love Is Colder Than Death).

In ’60s Japan, Gonda the owner of a gay bar runs a parallel drug business there. He is in a relationship with a transvestite Leda who manages the place for him. But with Leda losing her youth and her geisha-sensibilities ageing, Gonda shifts his attention to the young and pop-cultured Eddie, another transvestite working at the bar.

Funeral Parade of Roses follows a non-linear narrative with throwbacks to Eddie’s childhood without a father who left early and a mother who found his masculinity amusing. It all pieces together in the end while also capturing and satirizing the buzz of the underground drug, film and gay scene of ’60s-’70s Japan.

This was one of Stanley Kubrick's favourite films.

Story of a Prostitute (1965)

"Story of a Prostitute" (Shunpu Den) is a 1965 Japanese film directed by Seijun Suzuki. The movie is set during the Second Sino-Japanese War and follows the story of a young woman named Harumi, played by Yumiko Nogawa, who becomes a prostitute for the Japanese army. The film explores themes of love, sacrifice, and the dehumanizing effects of war. Seijun Suzuki's direction is characterized by his bold visual style and unconventional storytelling techniques, and "Story of a Prostitute" is no exception. The film features striking imagery and imaginative camerawork that enhance its emotional impact. "Story of a Prostitute" received critical acclaim for its powerful performances and gripping narrative. It's considered one of Suzuki's masterpieces and a highlight of Japanese cinema from the 1960s.

Click on the above image to watch the full film.

Butoh: Body on the Edge of Crisis

1990 / 89 min. / color
Directed by Michael Blackwood

Min Tanaka and Maijuku; Yoko Ashikawa and Hakutobo; Akaji Maro and Dai Rakuda Kan; Kazuo Ohno; Isamu Ohsuka and Byakko-sha; Natsu Nakajima and Muteki-sha; Sankaijuku; and Tatsumi Hijikata.

Butoh, a unique theater of improvisation, places the personal experiences of the dancer on center-stage. A Dionysian dance of nudity, eroticism, and sexuality, Butoh’s scale of expression ranges from meditative tenderness to excessive grotesqueness. Through a recalling of the Buddhist death dances of rural Japan, and use of music and masks Butoh is able to incorporate aspects of traditional theater into its extreme performances. An alliance of tradition and rebellion, Butoh is one of the most fascinating underground dance movements. Butoh: Body on the Edge of Crisis is a visually striking film portrait shot on location in Japan with the participation of the major Butoh choreographers and their companies.

Fushitsusha 不失者 @ St John-at-Hackney 2012 Full Set

I could write pages about Fushitsusha and the incredible Keiji Haino....but let us instead turn to the music....and let that teach us....

Freeze Me - Full Movie {English Sub}

Freeze Me (フリーズ・ミー Furiizu Mii?), or Freezer, is a 2000 Japanese film by director Takashi Ishii. This film stars Harumi Inoue as Chihiro, a rape victim who tries to live a normal life, only to be visited several years later by her three rapists in her apartment and raped again before she kills them.

Ichi The Killer (殺し屋１Koroshiya Ichi) Full Film (Extreme)

Ichi the Killer (殺し屋１ Koroshiya Ichi) is a 2001 Japanese film directed by Takashi Miike, written by Sakichi Sato, and based on Hideo Yamamoto's manga series of the same name. The film is notorious amongst moviegoers due to its extremely graphic violence. The film has received widespread controversy and is banned outright in several countries due to its high impact violence and graphic depictions of cruelty. In 2009, The Norwegian Media Authority reacted to the film and later classified the film as Rejected and banned the film due to "high impact violence and cruelty" and the film is still banned in Norway, but still available for home video purchase. The film has been banned outright in Malaysia since the film's distribution date in 2001 due to "very high impact violence and offensive depictions of cruelty" The film is banned uncut in Germany, and classified as "adults only" in a "heavily cut version". The film was released in the United States in a cut version rated NC-17.

The soundtrack was written and produced by Japanese band Boredoms, credited as "Karera Musication", under the direction of ex-guitarist Seiichi Yamamoto and percussionist/band leader Yoshimi P-We. Click on the image above for the full film.

Hiroshima Mon Amour

We should never forget.

Hiroshima mon amour (French pronunciation: [iʁoʃima mɔ̃n‿amuʁ], lit. Hiroshima, My Love, Japanese: 二十四時間の情事, romanized: Nijūyojikan no jōji, lit. 'Twenty-four hour love affair') is a 1959 romantic drama film directed by French director Alain Resnais and written by French author Marguerite Duras.

Resnais' first feature-length work, it was a co-production between France and Japan, and documents a series of intensely personal conversations (or one long conversation) over slightly more than a 24-hour period between an unnamed French actress and a Japanese architect. The film is notable for Resnais' innovative use of brief flashbacks to suggest flashes of memory, which create a nonlinear storyline.

Japanorama - Gyaru

Ganguro is an alternative fashion trend among young Japanese women which peaked in popularity around the year 2000, but remains evident today. The Shibuya and Ikebukuro districts of Tokyo are the center of ganguro fashion.

In ganguro fashion, a deep tan is combined with hair dyed in shades of orange to blonde, or a silver gray known as "high bleached". Black ink is used as eyeliner and white concealer is used as lipstick and eyeshadow. False eyelashes, plastic facial gems, and pearl powder are often added to this. Platform shoes and brightly-colored outfits complete the ganguro look. Also typical of ganguro fashion are tie-dyed sarongs, miniskirts, and lots of bracelets, rings, and necklaces.

The deep ganguro tan is in direct conflict with traditional Japanese ideas of feminine beauty. Due to this, as well as their use of slang, unconventional fashion sense, and perceived lack of hygiene, ganguro gals are almost always portrayed negatively by the Japanese media.

Fashion magazines like Egg and Cawaii have had a direct influence on the ganguro. Other popular ganguro magazines include Popteen and Ego System. The ganguro culture has evolved its own synchronized dances, called Para Para. Participants do predetermined moves at the same time, usually as accompaniment to J-pop music. Para Para events are held by ganguro circles, and involve either going to clubs to perform Para Para or gathering to learn new dances.

People generally associate the ganguro look with the old style. The newer style consists of a mid tan, natural makeup, long white to brown hair, with curls or straightened and backcombed. Current clothing trends include mini shorts, knee socks, and tanktops.

One of the most famous early ganguro girls was known as Buriteri, nicknamed after the black soy sauce used to flavor yellowtail fish in teriyaki cooking. Egg made her a star by frequently featuring her in its pages during the height of the ganguro craze. After modeling and advertising for the Shibuya tanning salon "Blacky", social pressure and negative press convinced Buriteri to retire from the ganguro lifestyle

Yamanba is a newer term often used to describe extreme practitioners of ganguro fashion. Yamanba feature darker tans and add white lipstick, pastel eye makeup, tiny metallic or glittery adhesives below the eyes, brightly-colored contact lenses, plastic dayglo-colored clothing, and incongruous accessories to the ganguro look. Some yamanba wear stuffed animals as decorations. The male equivalent is called a "center guy" (Sentaagai?, Center Street), a pun on the name of a pedestrian shopping street near Shibuya Station in Tokyo where yamanba and center guys are often seen.