Sumptuous Japanese schoolgirl Gorgeous (stunning slender brunette Kimiko Ikegami) and her six best female friends travel to the countryside to spend summer vacation at a creaky rundown house owned by her ailing estranged aunt (a splendidly sinister portrayal by Yoko Minamida). The girls soon discover that said abode is overrun by evil demonic spirits that are intent on eating them.
Director Nobuhiko Obayashi, working from a blithely berserk script by Chiho Katsura, brings a dazzling and wildly imaginative cinematic style and tremendously galvanizing go-for-it panache to the outrageous premise, maintains a breathless brisk pace throughout, pays affectionate homage to everything from cartoons to silent films, and tops everything off with a wickedly funny sense of kooky humor thanks to such jaw-dropping hysterical sights as a floating decapitated head biting a gal's butt, a lethal carnivorous piano, a bleeding clock, and a cat painting vomiting forth gallons of the red stuff. The terrifically tacky (not so) special effects, gaudy painted backdrops, obvious miniatures, goofy gore, and fake fruit punch blood all add immensely to this movie's considerable loopy pop-arty appeal. Moreover, the gals are all quite charming and fetching, with Miko Jinbo as the tough take-charge Kung-Fu, Ai Matsubara as the nerdy Prof, and Mieko Sato as the gluttonous Mac rating as the definite stand-outs. Yoshitaka Sakamoto's vibrant color cinematography provides a bright and splashy look. A totally bonkers blast.
Director Nobuhiko Obayashi, working from a blithely berserk script by Chiho Katsura, brings a dazzling and wildly imaginative cinematic style and tremendously galvanizing go-for-it panache to the outrageous premise, maintains a breathless brisk pace throughout, pays affectionate homage to everything from cartoons to silent films, and tops everything off with a wickedly funny sense of kooky humor thanks to such jaw-dropping hysterical sights as a floating decapitated head biting a gal's butt, a lethal carnivorous piano, a bleeding clock, and a cat painting vomiting forth gallons of the red stuff. The terrifically tacky (not so) special effects, gaudy painted backdrops, obvious miniatures, goofy gore, and fake fruit punch blood all add immensely to this movie's considerable loopy pop-arty appeal. Moreover, the gals are all quite charming and fetching, with Miko Jinbo as the tough take-charge Kung-Fu, Ai Matsubara as the nerdy Prof, and Mieko Sato as the gluttonous Mac rating as the definite stand-outs. Yoshitaka Sakamoto's vibrant color cinematography provides a bright and splashy look. A totally bonkers blast.