"Emperor Tomato Ketchup" is pretty typical for an experimental and/or underground film made in the time it was made. Of course it's in black and white, on grainy film stock, and many of the scenes are lit so poorly you can barely see anything, nor tell what's going on.
There's also no dialogue, but a bit of voice-over, and this supposed exposition only makes the movie more confusing. A little seems to allude to the movie's premise, ie. A world in which children have overthrown adults. Most of it, however, tells you nothing. It's just a voice making bizarre, nonsensical statements. You're already trying to work out what it is you're seeing, and then the voice-over only adds more to puzzle you.
If this movie is remembered by anyone, it will probably be for two things: one, the premise, which still seems like it could make an interesting movie if its handling could be less bizarre, and two, the scene in which a young boy is stripped naked by a group of three women, and then we see him rolling around on the bed with one of the women, who is also naked.
It never ceases to amaze me what you can get away with in the world of cinema. If this footage was separated from the movie, it would be called child pornography. And the scene goes on for so long, I kept expecting the FBI to kick my door in.
You could argue it's not porn because it's probably not intended to arouse (though what is it intended for if not that?). How is what that woman did, and the filmmakers by extension, not molestation? I wonder how the kid felt about being made to do that. I remember Mario van Peebles said he was probably traumatised after the sexual scene he had to perform in as a child, with an adult woman, in "Sweet Sweetback's Baadasssss Song". This was far more full on than that. I wonder how the kid felt about it.
