Blind Woman's Curse - Die verfluchte Schwertkämpferin mit dem Drachentattoo

'Blind Woman's Curse (1970)' is a bit of a mishmash of genres, a female yakuza semi-exploitation movie by way of early J-horror such as 'Kuroneko (1968)'. It's the first starring role for the piercingly beautiful Meiko Kaji and it showcases her steely gaze, strong constitution, gentle strength and capacity to kick ass right out of the gate; it's easy to see why she became such an icon. The film is mostly successful despite the disjointed nature of its relatively loose narrative, kept afloat by a bevy of colourful side characters and the never-quite-delivered-on promise of powerful otherworldly intervention. It establishes itself as an interesting endeavor right from its opening titles, which play over a battle that ensues after the lead reveals her gang's dragon tattoo which slithers its way across all of their backs. The narrative's most intriguing elements are relegated to the background for a lot of its runtime, but even the standard gang v gang stuff is compelling enough for what it is. Everything comes to a head in a brilliant final movement which begins with a striking sequence of a gang's march to war in front of an ominous blue sky, proceeds to feature several stabbings and slashings which spew geysers of ruby red blood, and ends with a one-on-one battle set in a surrealist arena marked by strange swirling clouds and the heavy presence of long-held hate. It's a really strong note on which to end and it makes up for the flick's slower portions towards its midsection. Still, this ultimately isn't as good as some of the films it obviously heavily inspired ('Lady Snowblood (1973)', for instance) and almost feels like a fairly standard entry in its specific subgenre. It has all the right elements but doesn't quite combine them in the most potent way. It's an enjoyable but relatively forgettable affair.

It's been a long time since I've seen this movie but I remember the plot as follows;

A woman in a cell in jail is being assaulted by other women inmates who draw back in fright when they rip her kimona off to reveal a tattoo of the head of a dragon, recognised by the inmates as having extraordinary significance.

She is the "Head" of an infamous group of swordfighters.All the other inmates want to know how she ended up imprisoned. The remainder of the movie recounts the exploits of a band of brigands who fight together against overwelming odds always starting and regrouping by standing together shoulder to shoulder, kimonos down, wriggling shoulders to make the full dragon tattoo (of which they each have a portion thereof) wriggle. The story is interspersed with various sexual exploits and goofy slapstick comedy, yet maintains a tense action-packed roller coster ride right to the end.

I only saw it the one time and yearn to see it again.

For me, nothing illustrates the yawning chasm between Eastern and Western culture as effectively as a film like Blind Woman's Curse. What might seem perfectly reasonable to a Japanese audience can be totally perplexing to an Englishman like myself. Of course, a film like Blind Woman's Curse, which features some truly 'unique' (for want of a better word) scenes, might seem just as baffling to the average Japanese person; it's hard to be sure. Suffice to say that the film, written and directed by Teruo Ishii (so you know there'll be some torture there somewhere), doesn't play out in predictable fashion. Or perhaps it does, if you're Japanese.

Gorgeous Meiko Kaji plays sword-swinging Akemi, leader of the Tachibana gang, who avenges her father's death by attacking the Goda gang. While dealing several deadly blows to the Goda boss, Akemi accidentally blinds his sister Aiko (Hoki Tokuda), who stupidly gets in the way. Akemi sees a black cat slurping up the girl's blood and believes herself to be cursed.

Three years later, Akemi is released from jail, and resumes leadership of her gang, but other organised criminals have their eyes on the Tachibana territory. Up and coming gang boss Dobashi (Tôru Abe) uses Tachibana traitor Tatsu to help him seize control, but is also assisted by a mysterious blind woman who is deadly with a blade.

Now this might sound like the makings of a rather routine tale of revenge, but trust me, the film is far from straightforward. For starters, one of the gangs is led by a man in a loincloth, who suffers from terrible body odour. Then there's the little matter of the weird hunchback (Tatsumi Hijikata) who lives in a theatre full of realistic looking wax heads and who cackles maniacally like Salacious Crumb; did I mention that he has the power to reanimate the dead by licking them? As for the black cat that haunts Akemi's dreams... it shows up from time to time, flying across the screen on clearly visible wires, occasionally making off with tattooed skin flayed from the backs of members of the Tachibana gang.

Throw in opium addict sex slaves, a zombie who loses his head, and lots of bright-red blood (including that Japanese favourite, excessive arterial spray), and what you have is a film that is definitely different, but not one that I can wholeheartedly recommend because it is so uneven, awkwardly lurching from yakuza gang drama, to supernatural thriller, to avant-garde arthouse flick.

5.5/10, rounded up to 6 for the spiral cloud backdrop during the final fight between Akemi and Aiko. Very cool!

Meiko Kaji spends 3 years in jail for avenging her Yakuza father, and on her release she inherits the leadership of the Tachibana gang. They're quite a nice bunch, for Yakuza, but a nasty rival gang are bent on taking over their territory. As if that wasn't bad enough, she appears to be under the curse of a black cat that got a taste of her victim's blood...

The film takes a broadly familiar period-Yakuza story and mixes it up with elements of horror and... strangeness, making for an intriguing cocktail of styles, moods and ideas. Teruo Ishii was one of the premier visual stylists of the Japanese exploitation wave, and this film shares the style even though it's relatively light on the exploitation. The plot is straightforward but the details make it interesting, and having Meiko Kaji as the lead actress certainly helps there too.

Good stuff!

The dragon-tattooed leader of the Tachibana Yakuza gang, Akemi (Lady Snowblood's Meiko Kaji) tries to avenge the death of her father in a rain-drenched showdown, only when she is about to deal the final death blow, she slashes at the eyes of the rival's boss younger sister, rendering her blind while a mysterious black cat laps up her blood. Akemi spends three years in jail before returning to the head of the Tachibana clan, where she intends to stop the violence that is causing her city to bleed and live out her days in peace. With the help of a Tachibana turncloak, a rival gang headed by Dobashi (Toru Abe) starts to invade Akemi's territory, planting drugs in their stalls and fighting them in the streets.

Dobashi finds some unexpected help with the arrival of a blind female swordsman, Aiko (Hoki Tokuda), the woman from the opening scene who is seeking vengeance. It's here that the film starts to get seriously weird. Working as a knife-thrower at a carnival show, Aiko is accompanied by two assistants, a grotesque hunchback with a fetish for decapitation, and the black cat that Akemi believed put a curse upon her for mutilating an innocent. Soon enough, Akemi's gang are turning up dead, often with their dragon tattoo flayed from their back. Less of a threat and providing most of the film's comic relief is another gang boss permanently adorned in a thong and cursed with foul-smelling body odour.

Blind Woman's Curse's mix of sword opera, Yakuza gangster movie, horror and surrealism is an unbalanced and occasionally frustrating concoction. If the story wasn't out-there enough, Kaji's disappointingly limited screen-time means that there is little holding everything together. The supernatural elements occur so sporadically that they seem out of place, but thanks to cinematographer Shigeru Kitaizumi, are beautiful to behold. The carnival scene is a montage of macabre and vibrant colours, with strange dancing and avant-garde plays from it's performers, and the climactic showdown between Akemi and Aiko plays out against a lavish painted backdrop of spiralling clouds. It's completely nonsensical, but it's an experience like no other.