Shungiku Uchida Movies
Takashi Miike spins this black comedy about the most dysfunctional family on the planet. The film opens with a father (Kenichi Endo) -- a gung-ho TV reporter -- not only paying to have sex with his estranged prostitute daughter in an anonymous hotel room but also videotaping the act as part of a documentary about "young people today." His son, who is brutalized on a daily basis by schoolyard bullies, beats, whips, and terrorizes his mother (Shungiku Uchida), who is covered with welts and bruises. Mom in turn finds solace in heroin and is not above hooking to pay for the habit. Their lives change for the better when a mysterious stranger (Kazushi Watanabe) cracks the father over the head with a rock and eventually shows them the way to familial happiness. Of course, this way includes multiple murders, necrophilia, and a kitchen full of breast milk. ~ Jonathan Crow, Rovi
Junji Sakamoto spins this tale of a socially inept yet indomitable woman searching for freedom and self-respect. Set in Kobe at the beginning of 1995, the film introduces Masako (Naomi Fujiyama), a withdrawn, middle-aged woman living above her mother's dry cleaning shop. She rarely leaves the house and is often tormented by her pretty younger sister. After their mother suddenly dies, the sisters' sibling rivalry takes a rather nasty turn. Immediately after the funeral, Masako strangles her sister in an explosion of rage and humiliation. Just as she stumbles into life on the run, the Kobe earthquake strikes. Terrified that the disaster is some divine retribution for her crime, she flees willy-nilly to Osaka, where, after losing her virginity to a rape, she finds shelter and eventually employment at a "love hotel." When the owner of that establishment hangs himself to escape a mountain of bad debt, Masako flees to Beppu on the southern island of Kyushu. There she falls in love with a down-and-out salesman and finds camaraderie with a world-weary bar owner. In spite of the constant air of violence and the occasional rape, Masako blossoms in her new surroundings until her past -- and the police -- start to catch up with her. This film was screened at the 2000 Toronto Film Festival. ~ Jonathan Crow, Rovi
- Starring:
- Naomi Fujiyama, Etsushi Toyokawa, (more)
- 1995
This unfortunately titled work is a critically acclaimed look at sexual abuse, based on the real-life experiences of comic book artist Shungiku Uchida, as told in her controversial best-seller. When the young Shizuko (Mami Nakamura) learns that she is pregnant after an encounter with a classmate, her thuggish stepfather (Michio Akiyama) rapes her as punishment. Soon such abuse becomes routine, as her mother (Kaori Momoi), a vampish club singer, roils in spite: her silence allows the atrocities to continue. Shizuko begins to retreat into her own internal world, fuelling her surreal, hallucinatory cartoons. Shizuko's stepfather is portrayed as a stereotypical chauvinist autocrat who demands that the women around him service his every whim, but who also has a freakish devotion to polishing the refrigerator into a shiny white sheen. This film was directed by first-time director and long-time independent producer Genjiro Arato. ~ Jonathan Crow, Rovi
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