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Junichiro Tanizaki‘s novel “Manji,” which translates to “Swastika” and later given the English title “Quicksand,” is a popular erotic story of obsession, jealousy, and destruction surrounding a four-way bisexual love affair that develops between upper-class citizens, the four lovers meant to comprise the Buddhist swastika symbolically. This iconic literary work has seen numerous film adaptations throughout the years. However, the most famous and arguably best one comes from director Yasuzo Masumura with his 1964 classic “Manji,” also known by the titles “Swastika” and “All Mixed Up.” This version would notably have a screenplay written by Kaneto Shindo, who international moviegoers will best remember for directing the horror masterpiece “Onibaba.”

Manji is screening at Camera Japan

Plotwise, married woman and artist Sonoko Kakiuchi is unhappy with her marriage to her husband, Kotaro. While attending a private art school, she meets fellow student Mitsuko Tokumitsu, whose beauty and devilish charm entices Sonoko.

Novelist Shohei Ooka would captivate readers with his anti-war novel “Fires on the Plain,” published in 1951. Inspired by his personal experiences from being drafted as a soldier, Ooka's chilling story depicts the gruesome violence and insanity that occurred during the Imperial Japanese Army's last stand in the Philippines on the island of Leyte during World War II. The award-winning book was praised for its gripping storytelling and raw examination of the horrors of war. With the success of the title, there were talks for a film adaptation for quite a while. Eventually, the nightmarish narrative would be superbly adapted for cinemas with Kon Ichikawa's “Fires on the Plain.”

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Daiei Film greenlighted the project, and the studio's president, Masaichi Nagata, would produce it. Kon Ichikawa would direct, and his wife, Natto Wada, would write the screenplay. There was initial...

After a near-five-year break, Kinuyo Tanaka returned behind the camera to direct her fourth feature film, “The Wandering Princess”. The studio Daiei project sees the director take advantage of both color and Cinemascope for the first time, garnering gorgeous results with both. By far Tanaka’s most ambitious directorial effort at this point in her career, the feature is a tragic historical epic that tackles a controversial part of modern Japanese history and is centered around the struggles of women.

“The Wandering Princess” is screening at the BFI London as part of “Kinuyo Tanaka: A Life in Film”

Based on the memoirs of Hiro Saga, the narrative begins at the outset of World War II and follows the story of Ryuko Korinkakura (Machiko Kyô), a distant relative of the emperor Hirohito. With Japan looking to cement ties throughout its empire, Ryuko is chosen as a suitable bride for Futetsu (Eiji Funakoshi...

Hello, dear readers! We’re back with a brand new assortment of horror and sci-fi home media releases this week, and as we creep closer and closer towards Halloween, there are definitely a handful of titles coming out on Tuesday that would be fun to check out as you get ready for the spooky season. Arrow Video is keeping busy with a handful of releases, including a 4K version of Dario Argento’s The Cat O’ Nine Tails and Blind Beast. And speaking of Argento, Blue Underground is showing Two Evil Eyes - his collaboration with George A. Romero - some love with their 4K presentation of the film. Larry Cohen’s A Return to Salem’s Lot is finally getting a Blu-ray, and if you missed the latest Conjuring film in theaters earlier this year, The Conjuring: The Devil Made Me Do It is headed home on multiple formats this week as well.

Yasuzo Masumura takes horror into kinky territory in an Edogawa Ranpo shocker about obsession, namely, mixing sex and death. Michio is the tactile-fixated blind sculptor who imprisons model Aki to serve as an ultimate objectified ‘body’ — but she eventually joins him, taking the lead on a delirious suicidal journey of discovery. Probably once considered pornographic, the 1969 show is fairly tame by today’s Nc-17 standards, and not as radically violent or abhorrent as one might expect — but it’s still loaded with weird, Dangerous Ideas. The sets are not to be believed — the unhinged artist lives in a surreal workspace surrounded by hundreds of oversized sculptures of body parts.

The Blind Beast (Moju)

Blu-ray

Arrow Academy

1969 / Color / 2:35 widescreen / 84 min. / Street Date August 24, 2021 / Moju; Warehouse / 39.95

Starring: Eiji Funakoshi, Mako Midori, Noriko Sengoku.

Cinematography: Setsuo Kobayashi

Art Director: Shigeo Muno

Original Music: Hikaru Hayashi

Written by Yoshio Shirasaka from a novel...

Yasuzô Masumura’s Blind Beast (1969) will be available on Blu-ray August 24th from Arrow Video

Blind Beast is a grotesque portrait of the bizarre relationship between a blind sculptor and his captive muse, adapted from a short story from Japans foremost master of the macabre, Edogawa Rampo.

An artists model, Aki (Mako Midori), is abducted, and awakens in a dark warehouse studio whose walls are decorated with outsized womens body parts eyes, lips, legs and breasts and dominated by two recumbent giant statues of male and female nudes. Her kidnapper introduces himself as Michio (Eiji Funakoshi), a blind sculptor whom she had witnessed previously at an exhibition in which she featured intently caressing a statue of her naked torso. Michio announces his intention of using her to sculpt the perfect female form. At first defiant, she eventually succumbs to his intense fixation on her body and finds herself drawn into his sightless world,...

For vintage Japanese classics Arrow is the place to be this summer. Yasuzô Masumura’s complicated tale of industrial espionage is an attack on the free enterprise system — even good people will do terrible things to get ahead, to prevail over the competition. It’s Tiger Car Company against the Yamato Car Company, winner take all. Plus, the extra feature The Black Report is not filler, but a terrific murder prosecution story, with Masumura’s patented dose of acid cynicism and murky misanthropy.

Black Test Car

Blu-ray

Arrow Video

1962 /95 min. / Kuro no tesuto kaa

Starring: Jirô Tamiya, Junko Kanô, Eiji Funakoshi, Hideo Takamatsu, Ichirô Sugai, Kichijiro Ueda.

Written by Kazuro Funabashi, Yoshihiro Ishimatsu from a novel by Sueyuki Kajiyama

Produced by Gentaro Nakajima

The Black Report

Blu-ray

Arrow Academy

1963 / 94 min. / Kuro no hôkokusho

Starring: Ken Utsui, Junko Kanô, Hideo Takamatsu, Shigeru Kôyama, Eitarô Ozawa, Bontarô Miake, Mieko Kondô.

Written by Yoshihiro Ishimatsu,...

Due to the huge commercial success of the Godzilla-films, produced by rival production company Toho, Daei Film wanted to create their own monster franchise. Director Noriaki Yuasa, who was originally set to direct a film involving killer rats, whose production was on halt, went on to helm the first Gamera-movie: “Gamera, the Giant Monster”. Over the years, the giant, pre-historic turtle, much like Godzilla, became cultural icon, featured in 12 films as well as comic books, manga and video games. With the upcoming release of all Daei’s entries by Arrow Video, we may take a look back at the first story involving the giant monster, a story about a vision of a world where a common cause was seen as something which would unite enemies and science could deliver that vision of harmony.

The story begins in the Arctic when the crash of an unknown aircraft causes a nuclear blast,...

The original hero in a half-shell returns! For the first time ever worldwide, all twelve tales of the adventures of everyone’s favourite titanic terrapin are collected together in one deluxe Blu-ray boxset.

This limited edition collectors’ set traces the decades-long evolution of Gamera, from the “friend of all children” in his more light-hearted earlier films to the Guardian of the Universe in the groundbreaking 1990s reboot series, often hailed as three of the best kaiju films ever made.

Limited Edition Contents

• Limited collectors’ edition packaging, housed in a large-format rigid box, fully illustrated by Matt Frank

• All twelve uncut original Japanese versions of the films in high definition, with lossless Japanese and English audio

• 4K restorations of the critically acclaimed Heisei trilogy

• Hours of new and archive bonus features, expert commentaries, interviews with cast and crew, and the worldwide Blu-ray premiere of Gammera The Invincible (the American theatrical version...

Probably Yukio Mishima’s best known acting part, “Afraid to Die (aka Man of the Biting Wind) is a lesser known Yakuza film, that eventually led the Nobel Prize nominee to write the novella “Star”, based on his experiences starring in the movie. On the occasion of the English translation of the novella, Japan Society is screening the film Friday, May 10.

The film revolves around Takeo Asahina, who is released from prison as the story begins, after serving a few years for stabbing a sub-boss of a rival Yakuza clan, Sagara. With a murder attempt aimed at him just before his release, Takeo is forced to go into hiding, ending up in an old cinema the family is running. Despite the fact that the whole Sagara gang and an asthmatic killer-for-hire are on his heels, Takeo continues his criminal endeavors with his lawyer-degree associate Aikawa, under the instructions of the clan’s uncle Gohei.

Japan Society will be celebrating the English translation of Yukio Mishima’s novella “Star”, based directly on his experience starring in Yasuzo Masumara’s film “Afraid to Die” with a 35mm screening of the film on Friday, May 10th, 2019 at 7pm.

Clad in a black leather jacket, renowned Japanese writer Yukio Mishima struts and preens as a small-time yakuza underboss in this oddity of postwar Japanese cinema directed by Yasuzo Masumura. Fresh out of jail and hiding out above a rundown Tokyo movie theater, the unsympathetic tough is hounded by a rival gang and an asthmatic killer-for-hire as he struggles to reconcile his criminal life with a newfound love interest (Ayako Wakao). “Afraid to Die” screens in celebration of a brand new English translation of Mishima’s 1961 novella Star (New Directions Publishing, 2019), a fictionalized account of his experience working on Masumura’s film.

The screening will be introduced by Star...

Gamera: The Giant Monster Directed by: Noriaki Yuasa Written by: Nisan Takahashi Starring: Yoshiro Uchida, Michiko Sugata, Eiji Funakoshi, Harumi Kiritachi For all of its crudeness, Gamera is genuinely effective, if only sporadically. For his first appearance on the mainland, Gamera quietly sneaks up on Toshio (Yoshiro Uchida) who is casually lying on a hill. He dips out of view as Toshio turns around, only to appear behind Toshio a few seconds later. Say what you will about the questionable lack of sound. How a 200-meter tall, radioactive turtle walks around without so much as snapping a twig is anyone’s guess, but the scene’s eerie effectiveness is proof that director Noriaki Yuasa put forth a valiant effort. Daiei Studio’s Godzilla clone is fairly shameless in its knock-off status, copying much of the formula, and even the style. Despite being released in 1965, Gamera is shot in black & white,...

One DVD we are Dying for is Shout! Factory's re-release of the original Gamera, The Giant Monster, if only so we can throw out all those awful cheapo copies that have been permeating the marketplace forever now. To get fans even more excited, two clips of the remastered flick have hit online, and we have them both for you right here.

"From Japan – the country that brought us such mythical movie monsters as Godzilla, Rodan, Mothra, and King Ghidorah – storms Gamera, the titanic terrapin feared by adults and loved by children. On May 18, 2010, Shout! Factory will unleash Gamera, The Giant Monster – Special Edition on DVD for the first time in its unedited original version, with English subtitles — in anamorphic widescreen from an all-new HD master. The DVD includes a 12-page booklet with an essay by director Noriaki Yuasa, a photo gallery, trailers, and more. The collectible Gamera, The Giant Monster...

Timing can be a funny thing. Just a couple of nights ago I was sitting in my bedroom at 2:00 am watching old Gamera movies, and today we get a press release that has us grinning from ear-to-ear!

From the Press Release

From Japan – the country that brought us such mythical movie monsters as Godzilla, Rodan, Mothra, and King Ghidorah – storms Gamera, the titanic terrapin feared by adults and loved by children. On May 18, 2010, Shout! Factory will unleash Gamera, The Giant Monster – Special Edition on DVD for the first time in its unedited original version, with English subtitles — in anamorphic widescreen from an all-new HD master. The DVD includes a 12-page booklet with an essay by director Noriaki Yuasa, a photo gallery, trailers, and more. The collectible Gamera, The Giant Monster Special Edition DVD is priced to own at $19.93.

Like all classic monster movies, it is the folly of man...