Hatsukoi: Jigoku-hen

Director and creator of this movie, Susumu Hani was one of the directors who were known for his avant garde movie making style. There were others in his league such as Nagisa Ooshima, and Kiju Yoshida that formed Japanese New Wave cinema movement. Hani himself had an avant garde lifestyle getting divorced from his wife finding out that he was having an affair with her sister, and Hani later marrying the sister of his ex-wife.

Hatsukoi Jigokuhen was an experimental movie made in the late '60s when Japan was experiencing new culture movement influenced by the Hippie culture. Most of Japan's avant garde films are from this period.

This movie was made for the youth of the time. It depicts the difficulties that the youth were experiencing at the time such as college entrance exam, country girl coming to Tokyo and having to work as a nude model to supplement her income, and a boy who's relationship with her is his first love. Both Kuniko Iwai who played Nanami and Akio Takahashi who played Shun were new comers into the movie business. I believe the little girl who played Mami is Hani's own four year old daughter Mio Hani.

While other directors who were part of the avant garde movement were seriously seeking new forms of liberal expression with various success, I believe that Hani has bona fide insanity about his approach. The movie shows the underground culture that existed in Japan at the time, but there are segments that are not related to the story that borders on child porn, SM element in what goes on inside the underground clubs.

All of the avant garde movies that came out of Japan are very quiet. Conversations are all quiet and slow, and so is the progress of the story. And all talk about free spirited people, that in many ways live irresponsible lives. In the end the style seemed to have failed to set new direction, and people lost interest in this style of movie. Looking at them 40 years later is interesting in seeing the society of Japan during that time.

An insecure guy falls in love with a young nude model.But his past sexual abuse hinders him of loving inhibitedly. He meets a little girl in the park instead... The story isn't that linear and that's why the freely linked episodes of this film just takes you on a shaky underwater rollercoaster ride. Beautiful camera-shots, excellent editing, great music, great acting...

Is this a film about "first love"? No -- there's no warm delightful discovery here. Maybe the film about the impossibility of love...which is a bleak statement.

What we do get is very painful depiction of sexual trauma, and gratuitous -- but stylish -- depictions of sexual violence and pedophilia. If the viewer is hoping to see innocent joys, they are in for waaaay more than they bargained for.

I admire the director Hani's courage and inventiveness -- many risks are taken. But the transgressive material feels mostly tacked-on -- for example, it's ambiguous if the "photo-shoot party scene" is "about pornography", or is simply pornography.

In the end, Hani's courage to break moral norms is stronger than his emotional courage. The film fearlessly portrays trauma and perversion, but not the courage of love and ethics. A particular failure of the film is how flat the female lead is. She's cute and she smiles a lot. But she is not given a chance to become completely human. Instead we're left only with tears without meaning or ending.

In line with a title like Nanami: The Inferno of First Love, this one is pretty grim overall. It's already a far from sunny look at love, but it delves into darker territory when it comes to exploring the histories of its two main characters, and in that sense, I feel this still has the capacity to shock.

It doesn't compromise and I guess I could call it a gutsy film. It sometimes feels like it's trying to be steamy, for lack of a better word, and that clashes with the more disturbing parts of the film. To what extent that was intentional and, if so, what purpose that was supposed to serve, I'm not sure. I guess that's the main reservation I have about Nanami: The Inferno of First Love.

It's one that's kind of impossible to recommend unless you like Japanese New Wave films (and that's a whole movement I have kind of mixed feelings about personally), but if you are and don't mind a disturbing and downbeat watch, then sure. Knock yourself out and ruin your day. It's only one day; you get plenty of them anyway. Hopefully.

Well who says the Japanese can't do French? A long slow-paced drama about a man with a past. A past that screws up his potential romances. Apparently his father was a bad man and now he can only talk to loose chicks.

The core is about first love in general. Most of us have dealt with it. This is how this one guy tries to.

The filming is sehr arty and you know the dialogue was deliberate. The pace reminds one of a student film at times and the camera-work was good for the seemingly non-existent budget.

I saw this on video years ago and saw it again in Tokyo during an art house revival. I wish it were better known.

This is one you can take your lady to as well.