An unrelated series of segments detailing the torture and oppression carried out against women in Feudal Japan.
The Good Stor(ies): Story 1-After being smitten with a strange man, a woman agrees to help him with his debt to a local mobster by making extra money as a geisha worker. When she realizes that he's been playing with her emotions as well as working in a rather limited capacity, they find their lives changed forever. This straightforward piece offers a rather intriguing start this one. The opening half, detailing Oito falling into Hanji's trap and becoming romantically linked together before realizing what's going on, offers an incredibly dream-like poetic lyricism with their tender relationship taking on a deeply haunting quality. While the exploitation angle is just as artistic, the scenes in the brothel offer a straightforward view of the geisha society she's been sold into which offers lingering views of the topless chicken fighting, the attempt to strip her naked to show off her and the various scenes of the girls taking their clients to bed. This part of the segment works nicely, but the sudden turn into torture a comeuppance at the end is incredibly awkward and doesn't really feel earned, coming across as a series of violent acts without purpose as it just erupts into the segment and then disappears. Still, there's plenty to like here.
Story 2-After hearing of a strange individual, a man goes in search of a famous woman nearby who claims to have the fetish of being attracted to men with grossly abnormal bodies. As he witnesses firsthand what's happening to her, her husband tries to set himself right in his wife's eyes. This segment was enjoyable if you're willing to go along with it. That all comes from the brazenly bizarre imagery and psychosexual fantasies at play here, which were much more apparent in this segment as we see what's going on in her mind. From being pawed at by dwarfen circus performers to riding her husband around like a horse and having a man with obscenely hairy legs sleep with her. That this is all displayed in grand fashion through a flashback detailing her abduction as a young woman and being repeatedly sexually degraded by a freakish person with burnt skin before being rescued gives us a truly deranged glimpse into her psyche which comes full circle once the finale comes in and we see the true extent of the impact the activities had on him as these final scenes pack a true punch as it's filled with the best gore and most nudity of the entire series.
The Bad Stor(ies): Story 3-Held captive in a lord's courtyard, a woman begins to form a savage and bizarre bond to him through his penchant for bondage games and sadistic tendencies. When their interactions inspire the wrath of a former hostess of the lord, she reveals plenty of troubling facts that put them in danger. There was quite a lot to like in this segment. The fact that it's the most overt exploitation ready of the stories comes into no doubt with the opening segment featuring a woman being abducted by a horse-bound riding, ensnared with a rope and dragged away through the countryside while other riders chase off after him as she gets carried off to her death. It's then equally matched by a wild and frenzied sequence of red kimono-wearing geisha's being stalked by a swarm of bulls with their horns lit on fire, emerging as a truly captivating piece with the chaotic animals charging at the fleeing girls who strip to avoid being punctured although not everyone does, making for a special dash of red to help things along. Although it stops from there in order to go for a plot-driven series of feudal intrigue, the scenes of the girl covered in gold body-paint offer some rather memorable moments. The advent of the revelation that comes about due to the later game being played where she enacts her revenge sets up the greatest part of the segment with the comically-fake but no less graphic C-section performed which are impactful mainly for the idea behind it more than anything. However, this does end on a whimper makes for a rather bizarre offering.
Rated Unrated/R: Continuous Nudity, Graphic Violence.
