Background
With more than 50 films under his belt, director Hisayasu Sato is by no means a novice. Still, most of his films never managed to cross the oceans and cultural barriers separating Japan from the rest of the world. That's not really a big blow to cultural diversity, since most of his films are very simple rape and/or sex films. Apart from "Naked Blood", his most well-known film is probably "Unfaithful Wife: Shameful Torture aka An Aria on Gaze aka The Bedroom", a erotic pinku filmu ("pink film", the name of a very popular genre of Japanese films. "Pinkus" are mostly shot straight for video, and often feature copious amounts of nudity, often interspersed with violence.) that stars Issei Sagawa, a convicted cannibal. While living and studying in Paris, Sagawa killed and ate part of the corpse of a female student. He was declared mentally unfit, and his father, a wealthy man, had him sent to a Japanese mental hospital, from which he was released little more than a year later. To this day, Sagawa has shown no remorse for his crime, and he has become a celebrity in Japan.
Cannibalism, as I am about to tell you, plays a part in "Naked Blood" as well.
Story
The plot revolves around a young scientific prodigy, Eiji, and his mother. Eiji has created a drug that by altering the way the brain transmits its impulses changes pain into pleasure. In other words, it is the ultimate painkiller. However, finding suitable subjects to test the drug on is hard when you're a reclusive teenager who makes chemicals in his room. Enter Eiji's mother, Yuki. Yuki is a doctor who is at the moment trying out a new contraceptive drug at the hospital where she works. Eiji, without his mother's knowledge, adds his own drug to the contraceptive and watches from a nearby rooftop as the three female subjects unknowingly have the drug pumped into their bloodstreams.
The three women leave the hospital together, (followed by Eiji, who spies on the girls to see what effects the drug has) entering a restaurant. During their conversation we learn more about them as they talk about what brings them the most joy. One of the girls is a glutton who thinks of little except food; one girl is extremely vain and the third, Rika, never answers the question. We do, however, learn that she never sleeps. So what brings Rika joy? Well, her giant cactus, which she communicates with through a virtual reality-system. Yes, you read correctly. Her cactus. This movie just entered the twilight zone.
Back at Eiji's house, we see his mother watching old Super 8-films of her dead husband, apparently unable to let go. One could assume that this is to show us that not all pains can be taken away by a simple drug - or it could just be filler material to give the film a more serious appearance. I will leave it up to you to judge for yourselves.
Eiji is also watching movies, but of a different kind. He watches all the surveillance tapes of the three girls, noting that the drug will start working within 48 hours. Rika, on the other hand, connects herself to her cactus and has a nightmarish vision of being chased, drenched in blood, by a camera-wielding Eiji.
Cut to the next day. Eiji starts following Rika, but because of the vision she had - or recieved from her cactus - she recognises him and he knows he's been spotted. He manages to gain her confidence, and she tells him about her insomnia - which was caused by the psychological shock of her first menstruation (it gets weirder, believe me) - and that her hearing is super-sensitive. Not only can she hear insects buzzing around, she can even hear plants talking. Ooookay. For some reason, she decides she's gonna trust Eiji, and takes him to her apartment.
In the meantime, the vain girl sits in front of her mirror and notices a stray hair in her armpit. She pulls it out, expecting it to hurt, but it feels good. The glutton is preparing dinner - tempura. As she is slicing the fish, she cuts herself, and notices that it doesn't hurt at all. Quite the opposite. As the effects of the drug - named MySon by Eiji - take hold, we see the vain girl take body biercing to a whole new level, while the glutton discovers the joy of dipping your own hand in tempura-batter and deep-frying it.
If you have seen this film in a store, you probably noticed the blurb "100% Gore - 100% Bloody - 100% Extreme" (which, apart from adding up to 300%, is completely false). Well, they're talking about this part of the film, the rest is pretty much your standard (or rather sub-standard) drama. So there are a few scenes in here that are extremely graphic, and certainly not for the squeamish. It is painfully obvious that Sato added these scenes - or at least made them so graphic - just as a marketing ploy. Sex sells, but so does violence. Well, the rest of the film tries - in vain - to offer us some kind of character development, and tells us what happens between Eiji and Rika.
Verdict
This is not a good film. I felt no kind of empathy for any of the characters, and didn't care if they deep-fried themselves or shoved huge pins through their body. Sato obviously wants it to be taken seriously - the second part of the film shows this, as he tries to tell a "serious" story that just ends up confusing and, in the end, completely uninteresting and very, very weird. The gore is another problem. It will undoubtedly make some people choose to watch another film simply because they don't like to watch blood and guts splashing across the screen - or a woman eating her own labia, for that matter. And if you're a gorehound like myself - well, there's just too little of it. A few minutes of gore and 70+ minutes of an uninteresting story does not make a good film.
Had a "real" director directed this film, it could maybe have been a film to recommend. There is a real story here, it's just not handled correctly. All this being said, I'd still recommend that you give it a go. Not because it's particularly good, but just to be able to say you've seen one of Sato's films.
With more than 50 films under his belt, director Hisayasu Sato is by no means a novice. Still, most of his films never managed to cross the oceans and cultural barriers separating Japan from the rest of the world. That's not really a big blow to cultural diversity, since most of his films are very simple rape and/or sex films. Apart from "Naked Blood", his most well-known film is probably "Unfaithful Wife: Shameful Torture aka An Aria on Gaze aka The Bedroom", a erotic pinku filmu ("pink film", the name of a very popular genre of Japanese films. "Pinkus" are mostly shot straight for video, and often feature copious amounts of nudity, often interspersed with violence.) that stars Issei Sagawa, a convicted cannibal. While living and studying in Paris, Sagawa killed and ate part of the corpse of a female student. He was declared mentally unfit, and his father, a wealthy man, had him sent to a Japanese mental hospital, from which he was released little more than a year later. To this day, Sagawa has shown no remorse for his crime, and he has become a celebrity in Japan.
Cannibalism, as I am about to tell you, plays a part in "Naked Blood" as well.
Story
The plot revolves around a young scientific prodigy, Eiji, and his mother. Eiji has created a drug that by altering the way the brain transmits its impulses changes pain into pleasure. In other words, it is the ultimate painkiller. However, finding suitable subjects to test the drug on is hard when you're a reclusive teenager who makes chemicals in his room. Enter Eiji's mother, Yuki. Yuki is a doctor who is at the moment trying out a new contraceptive drug at the hospital where she works. Eiji, without his mother's knowledge, adds his own drug to the contraceptive and watches from a nearby rooftop as the three female subjects unknowingly have the drug pumped into their bloodstreams.
The three women leave the hospital together, (followed by Eiji, who spies on the girls to see what effects the drug has) entering a restaurant. During their conversation we learn more about them as they talk about what brings them the most joy. One of the girls is a glutton who thinks of little except food; one girl is extremely vain and the third, Rika, never answers the question. We do, however, learn that she never sleeps. So what brings Rika joy? Well, her giant cactus, which she communicates with through a virtual reality-system. Yes, you read correctly. Her cactus. This movie just entered the twilight zone.
Back at Eiji's house, we see his mother watching old Super 8-films of her dead husband, apparently unable to let go. One could assume that this is to show us that not all pains can be taken away by a simple drug - or it could just be filler material to give the film a more serious appearance. I will leave it up to you to judge for yourselves.
Eiji is also watching movies, but of a different kind. He watches all the surveillance tapes of the three girls, noting that the drug will start working within 48 hours. Rika, on the other hand, connects herself to her cactus and has a nightmarish vision of being chased, drenched in blood, by a camera-wielding Eiji.
Cut to the next day. Eiji starts following Rika, but because of the vision she had - or recieved from her cactus - she recognises him and he knows he's been spotted. He manages to gain her confidence, and she tells him about her insomnia - which was caused by the psychological shock of her first menstruation (it gets weirder, believe me) - and that her hearing is super-sensitive. Not only can she hear insects buzzing around, she can even hear plants talking. Ooookay. For some reason, she decides she's gonna trust Eiji, and takes him to her apartment.
In the meantime, the vain girl sits in front of her mirror and notices a stray hair in her armpit. She pulls it out, expecting it to hurt, but it feels good. The glutton is preparing dinner - tempura. As she is slicing the fish, she cuts herself, and notices that it doesn't hurt at all. Quite the opposite. As the effects of the drug - named MySon by Eiji - take hold, we see the vain girl take body biercing to a whole new level, while the glutton discovers the joy of dipping your own hand in tempura-batter and deep-frying it.
If you have seen this film in a store, you probably noticed the blurb "100% Gore - 100% Bloody - 100% Extreme" (which, apart from adding up to 300%, is completely false). Well, they're talking about this part of the film, the rest is pretty much your standard (or rather sub-standard) drama. So there are a few scenes in here that are extremely graphic, and certainly not for the squeamish. It is painfully obvious that Sato added these scenes - or at least made them so graphic - just as a marketing ploy. Sex sells, but so does violence. Well, the rest of the film tries - in vain - to offer us some kind of character development, and tells us what happens between Eiji and Rika.
Verdict
This is not a good film. I felt no kind of empathy for any of the characters, and didn't care if they deep-fried themselves or shoved huge pins through their body. Sato obviously wants it to be taken seriously - the second part of the film shows this, as he tries to tell a "serious" story that just ends up confusing and, in the end, completely uninteresting and very, very weird. The gore is another problem. It will undoubtedly make some people choose to watch another film simply because they don't like to watch blood and guts splashing across the screen - or a woman eating her own labia, for that matter. And if you're a gorehound like myself - well, there's just too little of it. A few minutes of gore and 70+ minutes of an uninteresting story does not make a good film.
Had a "real" director directed this film, it could maybe have been a film to recommend. There is a real story here, it's just not handled correctly. All this being said, I'd still recommend that you give it a go. Not because it's particularly good, but just to be able to say you've seen one of Sato's films.
