Horror of the Malformed Men

It's funny that Ishii says he was not familiar with the Moreau storyline because this flick looks so much like a crazy adaptation for it. Not an intense feature but one that will serve you very memorable freaky and somewhat psychedelic moments that, out of the wild context, will remind you of all the Japanese contemporary horror everyone yells for (think Ring, Dark Water as much as video games like Siren and Project Zero...). Very poorly written plot, but who cares when they're served such crazy visions and a final I would place in my top 10 of mindblowing movie endings - but that's just me... That's a very hard to see movie, and well worth seeing if you get the chance.

Director Teruo Ishii's HORRORS OF MALFORMED MEN opens in a mental institution in 1925, where Hitomi (Teruo Yoshida) tries to remember the events that landed him there. This leads him on a bizarre journey of discovery, including his having to impersonate a dead man. There are some intriguing and humorous scenes along the way, until the title comes into play.

Admittedly, this is a weird movie. The first half is straightforward enough, though it has its odd moments. However, once we're taken to the island of Hitomi's father, the real strangeness begins. Describing it just wouldn't do it justice. It simply must be witnessed. Personally, the closest I can get is that it's sort of what you would have if THE ISLAND OF DR. MOREAU had been directed by Jodorowsky. If you enjoy mad science, female nudity, mutants, and / or unsavory situations, then you'll probably love this.

Things about this movie you won't soon forget:

#1- The crab scene!

#2- The secret chair!

#3- That damned lullaby!

#4- The fireworks display at the end!

A perverse, twisted nightmare that everyone should see at least once...

Postwar Japan gave birth to probably one of the most consistently weird dance forms, Butoh. It rather hard to describe except that the processions of anguished clay caked naked bodies and rag covered transvestites makes me think of a nuclear holocaust. Since Japan is the only country with any experience with the horrors of a nuclear holocaust, it isn't surprising.

We open with a dazed man in the middle of a cage of naked crazy women in a mental institution. We soon learn that he's an inmate as well. He is haunted by an odd children's lullaby. That night a strange bald man tries to kill him but instead our hero kills the bald man and escapes. Our hero hears the unusual lullaby and finds a circus performer who seems to come from the same remote place on the coast. He makes his way to the coast and finds out that a rich man who looks exactly like him has just died. He digs up the body and switches clothing becoming the dead man mistakenly buried too soon. Our hero then attempts to discover the strange secrets of the dead man's family while trying to imitate the deceased.

After watching this production I am very interested in why this film has been banned in Japan for so long. There are plenty of films that are WAY MORE DISTURBING, disgusting or horrifying from Japan, some made the same year! The most likely part is the second half of the film when the Butoh dancers are given plenty of screen time but much of it is mystifying to me rather then disturbing. The couple of torture scenes are rough but not worse then anything I've seen from any pinku film.

Anyway the film is quite good for the first half and starts to fall apart during the second half. It seems the the director and his camera person really didn't know what to do with the Butoh dancers. We get a number of very striking Butoh scenarios, poorly filmed (compared to the excellent filming in the rest of the film), that go by with the main characters just gazing on in disbelief. No real connection to the plot.

An interesting experiment.

Horrors of Malformed Men is a quite experimental movie by veteran director Ishii Teruo that has been inspired by the tales of famous mystery and horror author Edogawa Rampo who had himself been inspired by Western authors such as Edgar Allan Poe. This experimental movie at the pulse of its time combines several of these tales. The main issue is that this fusion isn't always fluid and leads to two completely contrasting parts.

The first half of the movie is a murder mystery tale. A medical student without any recollection of his past is trapped in a sinister asylum. He manages to escape when one of the guards attempts to murder him. The fugitive discovers the photograph of a recently deceased man from a prosperous family who looks exactly like him. The medical student decides to take the dead man's identity to find out the truth about his origins and escape from the police.

The second half of the movie is a supernatural horror tale. The medical student travels to the island of a mad scientist who transforms perfectly normal humans into hideous freaks to create a better society. He gets captured, manipulated and threatened by the scientist and attempts to escape the island and prevent the scientist's megalomanic plans.

It's probably a matter of prefence whether you prefer the first or the second half of the movie but they are so different from each other that few people will equally appreciate both parts. The first half is atmospheric, mysterious and surprising as it convinces with clever storytelling and intriguing characters. It recalls numerous European murder mystery films as especially the German Edgar Wallace films and the Italian giallo genre come to mind. The second half is much more brutal, experimental and frantic and ventures into experimental cinematography with hectic camera work, numerous flashbacks and colourful locations. It's a mixture of Japan's very own pink film genre of the sixties and American pre-war science-fiction and horror cinema somewhere between King Kong and Island of Lost Souls.

In the end, Horrors of Malformed Men is certainly daring, entertaining and unconventional. However, the script is all over the place and the conclusion might even be too unconventional for most open-minded cineasts. Ishii Teruo should have created two different movies here instead of putting together two ideas that don't gel.

Wow, this is a must have for Japanese horror fans, and can you believe it, banned for all those years. Outstanding story involving a man finding his way back to his origins, which include his Father making malformed men, and ladies. My favorite, the goat women. This is quite a gruesome horror film from 1969 or so, that got banned in Japan, and therefore restricted everywhere. Don't worry, it's available now, and you need to see it, before it disappears again. Great DVD too, as it contains a commentary from some historians that will bore you to death. It did me at least, but nothing could damage my affection for this excellent shocker for the times. You thought your Father had problems, wait until you meet this dude. I like this one, it is decadent, gruesome, and has some naked girls. And should I forget, a pretty shocking depiction of the result of malformed men. Yes, Malformed Men, you have been warned.