So it’s been a long time since I’ve ventured back into the old time machine and go back a decade to revisit or check out certain films that people across the internet champion from the 90s.   Here it is and this week I plan on seeing for the first time an Asian film by Takashi Miike.

If you’re a fan of horror, and even more Asian horror, then you should’ve heard of this film.  It is well known as the movie where a chick takes a piano wire to a guy and dismembers him.  I actually decided to check out this movie based on that one line.  Now some may consider that a spoiler, but after a decade of existence that has become the sales pitch and I have to say that it isn’t that great a pitch.  I found that this movie was really unimpressive, especially after all the hype I found coming from the Asian horror fan base over this movie.

The film is about Shigeharu Aoyama [Ryo Ishibashi] who lost his wife.  After seven years of living his life and raising his son he decides that he should start looking for a woman to remarry.  His friend Yasuhisa Yoshikawa [Jun Kunimura] suggests that instead of going through the whole trouble of dating to find a girl they should hold an audition for a movie and he would be able to meet all these women and he can decide who he would like to get to know better and see where it goes from there.  Aoyama has his eyes set on Asami Yamazaki [Eihi Shiina], a quiet reserved girl who had to give up her passion of ballet dancing after incurring a career ending injury to her hip.

The movie shows itself as a possibly sweet romance for the first half.  However, I found a problem with this since I, as well as everyone else at this stage I’d assume, am walking into the movie knowing some crazy stuff is going to be happening and I’m paying super attention to Asami to find all her deep hidden nature.  In the second half of the film and we see Asami at home for the first time we finally see that very strange nature that we’ve been searching for.  We see her with her head pointing down to the ground with a lifeless look to her current pose waiting for Aoyama to phone her.  We even see a strange bag in the room that we are curious to know what is inside.

I continue to reiterate that I was unimpressed with the movie, but at the same time that doesn’t mean I hated it.  I found the story quite interesting and the direction well done.  The film is not a film of just over the top gore and violence and at the same time there is more focus on the characters and how they react to the situations and their desires than anything else.  The only problem I have is that we don’t get to spend enough with Asami to completely understand why she does what she does.  Now some may tell me that the point of the story was not to understand Asami but to follow Aoyama and feel sorry for how he gets screwed.   To that I say, then why did we get a half assed back-story for Asami, that we can only assume is true, which doesn’t even pretend to explain her sadistic nature and this is why I don’t love this movie.

In the end I think fans of fucked up movies will like this film and if you can make it through the first half which is pretty dull and boring then you will find a cool character flick here.

IMDB says 7.4/10

Rotten Tomatoes says 76%

I say 7.0/10