Shojo no harawata

When i sit down to watch a movie with a name such a this and a reputation to be one of the most grotesque japanese cinema has to offer i await to be repulsed. That didn´t happen. The first half of the movie was filled with softcore leening towards rape-porn, often featured in japanese films such as this. The few gore scenes where placed in the dark so you couldn´t see what was happening. There is of course the infamous highlight with chopped of hands, naked girls and lots of monster semen, but this comes too late. You are already uninterested. So, if this sounds appealing, see the movie with low expectations.

Given the title and outlandish box art, I was ready for just about anything. Perhaps my expectation were forced just a bit to high, because I was left a little dry.

A film crew working on a soft-core sex movie end up at a strange house when they get lost in the fog and decide the best way to spend the evening is to have sex. Where hasn't this set up been used before? The difference here is the uber-perverse nature of the sex. Not allowed to show all the goods (groin shots were illegal in Japan for a long time, what is shown is fogged out) the movie tries as hard as it can to show the viewer just how unnatural sex can be.

Amidst all the kinky goings on, a mud monster (whose origin I can't fathom) shows up and begins murdering the men and raping the women...then murdering them too. Some of the sights are a bit much, most notably a woman having her intestines pulled out through her vagina or another woman spitting out a mouthful of...stuff, but otherwise the gore is pretty standard fare.

Ultimately the film is pulled down by it's own designs; it's too over-sexed to be a strait horror picture and too gruesome to work as a sex flick. The mediums can work, but there need to be a balance.

4/10

Director Kazuo Komizu started out as an assistant director and sometime co-writer to the great Koji Wakamatsu, so one might hope that the genius rubbed off. On the evidence of Guts of a Virgin, it did and it didn't. There is something of a similar innate skill with sleaze, a knowledge of the power of the frame, of close ups and still, gazing shots. He knows the illicit thrill of the female objectified, the female image dismembered, though rarely erotic this is a film with some aesthetic accomplishment to its shows of tits and asses, of beautiful legs and moaning faces. The use of discreet blurs rather than full pixellation to hide prohibited details helps too, conveying a certain woozy artiness. But sadly this is about the extent of the potency passed down and it gets rather stretched. The plot is thin, three female models and three fashion photographers finish shooting for the day but get lost in fog, leading them to spend the night in an abandoned house that just so happens to be part of the prowling ground of a dirt caked monster with a big dick. Lots of sex and assorted death follow. Thin stuff, and the writing gives no weight. The males are mean and manipulative, out for nought but throwaway thrills and the women are absurdly naive, to the point of being unsympathetic. They don't relate in especially interesting ways, so little is left but mostly joyless sex and it gets a bit dull despite the stylish shooting. The performers are all decent so if not especially interesting all the time its certainly convincing, the men are really pretty slimy and the women evidence some legitimate discomfort. Also one physical feat that seemed pretty impressive to a weakling like me (I won't say what). But it does get a bit wearying Fortunately the horror side of things is quality bizarro entertainment and the pace gradually quickens throughout the film to reach a borderline intense finale (which is also blithely bonkers in a rather pleasing manner). Atmospheric use of fog and backlighting helps, and a distinctly odd feel is produced by the decision to cut from the action to jarring visual metaphors and back. The gore effects are cheap but fun and the kills reasonably inspired and best of all unpredictable, with one being an absolute gonzo marvel. All of which doesn't entirely make up for the various longueurs, but it goes a long way in trying. I guess to sum up this is a worthy pit-stop for fans of lunatic trash, especially those with a big taste for soft-core, but no classic or anything.

After reading the opinions of other users I thought it a good idea to express my own.

Plot: Soft-core filmmakers take nubile young women to a remote house under the pretense of "advancing" their careers. Too bad for them a maniac in the form of a demon with a large penis is stalking and killing them.

There is a ton of soft-core sex (including demon sex), a beheading, a disemboweling, severed hand masturbation....well, these are things already mentioned in previous comments so let's get to the point of why I enjoyed this movie.

Its sleazy, trashy, a bit gory, and a whole helluva lot of fun. This movie does things that were completely shocking and unexpected and had me, more than once, laughing and crying out, "OMG!". If you're like me you've seen just about every piece of exploitative filth made in the US and Europe, but this film tops them all. And it has an ending which left me gape-mouthed and wanting more.

As far as the optical censoring mentioned in other posts, yes, its true. Now to clarify this. The Japanese do not allow below the waist nudity, period. Optical fogging is a fact even in porn. To the user who hopes Synapse would correct this, they won't. Check out their website and you can find an old news piece that talks about how the actress' wore small pieces of white tape over their genitalia. So, even if the fogging is removed, you won't see anything. But don't let this stand in the way.

If you are a fan of Asian exploitation, horror, or manga I can't imagine you wouldn't enjoy this movie. In fact, that's what it reminded me of; a live action manga. So, check it out.

AKA Guts of a Virgin

Japanese horror-exploitation flick directed by Kazuo 'Gaira' Komizu (Battle Girl: The Living Dead in Tokyo Bay), and the first instalment in his 'Gut's Trilogy'. Three guys (a professional photographer, his boss and one of his assistants) and three girls (a model, a wannabe model there to 'learn the ropes', and another assistant) are on a photoshoot in the mountains in the middle of nowhere. At the end of the day they head back towards civilisation in their camper van, but get lost in the dark and the fog. They stumble across a house under construction in some woods and decide to spend the night there before continuing on the next day when it's safe. After eating and drinking (this half-built house apparently has a fully-stocked refrigerator!) two of the guys start pressuring the girls to have sex with them, promising them 'work' in the future. Meanwhile a humanoid 'mud creature' emerges from the earth outside and makes its way towards the house. As various members of the group venture outside they're stalked and killed by the creature in various gory ways.

This kinda plays out like a variation on the The Evil Dead, but with even less budget and a *ton* of softcore sleaze. There are even a couple of low 'Raimi-cam' shots through the woods. It's a weird film - as though they had a script for a 'cabin in the woods' horror and one for a softcore porno lying around and decided to combine them. There is a *lot* of flesh on show here and a *lot* of unsavoury acts depicted (although nothing actually hardcore onscreen). It basically takes the Friday the 13th horny kids/nudity trope and dials it up to 11. Thing is, the nudity/sex gets real boring, real quick, and you're just waiting for the gore. When that finally comes, some of it is pretty well done (we get a hook through the throat, an Omen-style rod/spike impalement, a beheading courtesy of a loose pane of glass - plus some stuff that I won't go into!). The prosthetics work is pretty good in places and laughably bad in others, the story is almost non-existent, and the performances cartoonish. On the other hand, the kills are entertaining, the synth score is moody and catchy, and the photography in the woods with the backlit fog is very atmospheric.

The 'Guts Trilogy' was *very* hard to get hold of in the west for a long time and gained a reputation for being 'some of the sickest films ever made', but this first one, at least, doesn't come close for me. That said, it's obviously designed to shock - and depending on your sensibilities it may well do. Apparently the next entry is even 'better'! We'll see... 5/10.