Yes, the Japanese can have serial killers too, and they can make movies about them, and this is one powerful movie. In its technique, it comes closer to "Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer" in its episodic and somewhat rambling narrative than to any of the dozens of other American junk being ground out about Ed Gein the Butcher or "Ted Bundy." The serial murderer, a real one, is Iwao Inokizu, played with intensity and charm by Ken Ogata, who passed away a few months ago. There are some discontinuities in the narrative that may make this rather long story a little hard to follow, perhaps especially for Westerners. Iwao's first two murders are both pointless and bloody. Of the remaining three, only one takes place on screen and is relatively brief. And the story is told in flashbacks, with sudden shifts from place to place, and only a handful of characters to serve as anchors in time and space.
Man, have the writers got Antisocial Personality Disorder down pat. They illustrate the condition as well as Iwao exemplified it. Iwao kills people -- five all together, matching Jack the Ripper -- for virtually no reason. He poses as a lawyer or a distinguished professor. He moves from city to city relentlessly and cons people out of money with his authoritative charm.
The movie is mature. It's made for grown-ups, not children. And not because of any sensationalism. That would be targeting thrill-starved teens of today. But rather because of the absence of sensationalism. It's hard to describe a film about a serial killer as showing a sense of taste but this one does. When Iwao forms a bond with an elderly woman whom he considers his "prison buddy" because she's been in jail, he decides to strangle her. When she walks unwittingly into a darkened room, we see him enter behind her with a rope. And that's it. Cut. It reminds me of the scene in Val Lewton's "The Body Snatchers" when the young girl who sings carols is murdered off screen.
Iwao's family were devout Catholics, so much so that when Iwao's father develops impure thoughts about Iwao's wife he asks to be excommunicated. And the family insist that before Iwao is married, his bride convert from Buddhism. This came as a bit of a surprise because in much of Japan religion, although taken seriously, isn't so readily and so intensely divided into sects and denominations. A Shinto shrine at home is in no way incompatible with a Christian wedding and a Buddhist funeral ceremony.
There is a scene at the end in which Iwao's father and the daughter-in-law whom he loves, and who loves him, dispose of Iwao's bones after the hanging by flinging them from an isolated hill top. The bones seem to freeze in mid-air. I take this to be not director Imamura's endorsement of anything supernatural, just the symbolic perceptions of Iwao's family. He was so thoroughly rotten, and blood is blood, that it's not easy to get rid of him even after he's dead. The scene is probably more easily understood in Japan, where family honor and shame are considerations to be seriously reckoned with.
It's a lengthy film and at times a little confusing, but it packs a real wallop.
Man, have the writers got Antisocial Personality Disorder down pat. They illustrate the condition as well as Iwao exemplified it. Iwao kills people -- five all together, matching Jack the Ripper -- for virtually no reason. He poses as a lawyer or a distinguished professor. He moves from city to city relentlessly and cons people out of money with his authoritative charm.
The movie is mature. It's made for grown-ups, not children. And not because of any sensationalism. That would be targeting thrill-starved teens of today. But rather because of the absence of sensationalism. It's hard to describe a film about a serial killer as showing a sense of taste but this one does. When Iwao forms a bond with an elderly woman whom he considers his "prison buddy" because she's been in jail, he decides to strangle her. When she walks unwittingly into a darkened room, we see him enter behind her with a rope. And that's it. Cut. It reminds me of the scene in Val Lewton's "The Body Snatchers" when the young girl who sings carols is murdered off screen.
Iwao's family were devout Catholics, so much so that when Iwao's father develops impure thoughts about Iwao's wife he asks to be excommunicated. And the family insist that before Iwao is married, his bride convert from Buddhism. This came as a bit of a surprise because in much of Japan religion, although taken seriously, isn't so readily and so intensely divided into sects and denominations. A Shinto shrine at home is in no way incompatible with a Christian wedding and a Buddhist funeral ceremony.
There is a scene at the end in which Iwao's father and the daughter-in-law whom he loves, and who loves him, dispose of Iwao's bones after the hanging by flinging them from an isolated hill top. The bones seem to freeze in mid-air. I take this to be not director Imamura's endorsement of anything supernatural, just the symbolic perceptions of Iwao's family. He was so thoroughly rotten, and blood is blood, that it's not easy to get rid of him even after he's dead. The scene is probably more easily understood in Japan, where family honor and shame are considerations to be seriously reckoned with.
It's a lengthy film and at times a little confusing, but it packs a real wallop.