Gokushiteki erosu: Renka 1974

I was fascinated by Kazuo Hara's THE EMPEROR'S NAKED ARMY MARCHES ON, so I thought I'd try of his earlier documentaries. In this one, he follows his ex-girlfriend Miyuki Takeda and their child to Okinawa where she bounces from a lesbian relationship to an interracial hetero relationship to a self-run day care facility and back to the mainland where she gives birth without medical assistance. Although Takeda is a fiercely independent, modernized woman and her relationship to the filmmaker provides some tense and compelling material, ultimately she's not nearly as engaging a subject as Okuzaki from NAKED ARMY. The most revealing aspects come from the interactions between Hara and Takeda, especially when he brings his new girlfriend into the picture! I also found the scenes of Takeda arguing with her nearly-silent girlfriend very interesting. However, there's a lot of "downtime" without much that's very compelling. The film is also plagued with technical problems... out-of-sync sound, a noisy camera, and the entire lengthy birth scene is out of focus (which Hara rightfully excuses because of his emotional state). This film might make a good companion piece to SHERMAN'S MARCH, although McElwee does a lot more to keep momentum going.