Celluloid Nightmares

MU ZAN E is an extremely rough Japanese gore/sexual violence film by anyone's standards. Anyone who doesn't find some of the scenes in this film disgusting is inhuman. That being said, since that is exactly what I was looking for - I wasn't disappointed.

I will give a brief synopsis, and this is what I gathered, since my copy has no English subtitles or dubs: A reporter is doing some research on underground sex films. She does interviews with various people in the "industry" and goes on-set during the filming of a production. During her research, she comes across some snuff material. Apparently she begins researching that type of stuff too, and when she gets too close, certain people aren't happy with her prying and decide to take action against her...

Honestly, this film is NASTY,NASTY,NASTY. I can't think of anyone who truly enjoys this type of material as entertainment. My main interest in seeking this film is that I'm always looking for the most "shocking" films available. Let me tell ya, this is one of 'em. Not only that, but the story (what I could make of it) seemed pretty interesting (and far superior and more straight-forward than Yamnouchi's other offerings...), and I hope that Unearthed Films will release an English subtitled version. As far as I know, they hold the rights here in the U.S. but have no ETA as to when it will be released. I give this film a pretty high rating because it does exactly what it's intention is to do - repel, repulse and sicken - but again, the story is pretty decent too, and even has an unexpected twist, which doesn't always happen in this new realm of Asian "super extreme" gore films. Recommended only for you truly sick f!cks out there!!! 8.5/10

Okay. I'd read that this was the absolute bomb (as far as extreme exploits were concerned), so I was really psyched for this one. All I can say is, "meh". Maybe it's the fact that I can't see anything with these damned, pixelized Jap flicks. Weren't these guys Samurais once? I mean, can you possibly imagine Samurais covering up their female spoils with pixelation? I think not.

Anyway, the plot (and I had no subs, so bear with me). A reporter is doing an exposé on the porn industry and stumbles onto something that she shouldn't have. The perpetrators of said stumbling kidnap her and do some nasty stuff to our heroine.

Okay, this one does have some things going for it. Some juicy menstrual "teething", a nipple bitten off and a few disturbing moments involving damsels in distress (on hand-held camera). However, nothing can really be seen while our Japanese buddies pixelate everything out. I mean, it would be really easy to save money on special effects and makeup men by simply producing your film in Japan. A little pixelation here, a little pixelation there and voilà; budget met.

I don't normally care for Italian flicks, but at least they show the nasty bits in full view of the camera. Why settle for a pixelated, bitten nipple when you can see a woman hoisted up by her breasts on meathooks? Oh well. Rant over. I can at least say that I saw it.

Charlie.

Muzan e, stated as a sickie from Japan, only available on terrible downloads and terrible copies. But let me tell you, it had a proper release on DVD in 2010 but is already OOP, it was maybe available for a few days. If you know your way you could catch a copy, otherwise you will be stuck forever with a bad copy. Luckily I found me a digital remaster on DVD, and have seen the downloads I can say, what an improvement. So far so good. But the flick itself isn't that sick as told. The mystery about this flick is solved now that it is available on DVD with interviews with the director. Still, it's a good story and I guess that Japanese people do have a n obsession with tampons because here we go again just like in Tampon Tango. But it's the other way, the tampon, a used one, is being teared out of a vagina and is being put into the girls mouth. Than a guy goes sucking out the blood out of her, well, you can guess it. One reporter goes searching what is going on in the world of porn, but get a VHS with some snuff on it, she wants to know if it's real and yes, she finds out but it goes wrong from there. There is a lot of blah blah in it and sadly for most people it won't have subs, on the other hand, private parts are blurred and even some faces are blurred. For me it's okay to see but I wouldn't classify it in the top ten of sickest flicks ever. Still, glad I have it in my possession as official remastered release.

I checked this movie out for the same reasons as most others, I would presume. I wanted to see what has been hyped as "some of the nastiest sh*t out there." But sadly I was once again disappointed, as I have been many times before when that line has been used to describe a horror/gore/splatter film. The storyline is nothing more than a reporter following up a tape with snuff on it and gets too close to the people involved for her own good. I was expecting a lot of gore, blood and guts in this one, but there was definitely not as much as the hype had led me to believe. As most Japanese produced films of this kind, this one has gone through pixel censorship, meaning it doesn't show all the really nasty stuff which is really why you'd like to see this film in the first place. (If you're one of the very few people who would like to see it simply because of the storyline, I'd suggest you save your money for something better.) If you're not used to this type of extreme film, I bet this could be "the nastiest sh*t". But if you, like me, have seen quite a lot in the genre, this film really isn't any special in terms of "extremeness". For the fans of this type of films, I'd highly recommend Men Behind The Sun, Audition and/or Ichi the Killer instead!

Daisuke Yamanouchi's "Mu Zan E" is about a young journalist,who is searching for snuff movies.The film shows us a snuff/porn making underground industry ala "Last House on Dead End Street" or "Tesis".It's extremely grim and gory and it pulls no punches with its sheer nastiness.There are some incredibly revolting scenes of gore and sexual violence,so fans of Japanese pinku eiga sickies won't be disappointed.It seems to me that Japanese culture is loaded with sadism and bloodletting and this carries over into the realms of cinema and literature.Anyway,if you're a fan of the "Guinea Pig" series or "Cannibal Holocaust" you can't miss this one.However if you're squeamish don't watch it!