Rubber's Lover

Scientists use a brain-altering drug to conduct experiments, after one such project goes astray, they need to find another test subject in this Japanese splatter-punk film. On it's surface Rubber's Lover can be compared to Tetsuo: the Iron Man (shot in black and white, weird, kinetic, and machine driven), but it's different enough to stand on it's own merits, even if it's not nearly as good as the aforementioned film. Good for a viewing or two, but it's not one of the films that you'll return to over and over again. Still for an obviously low-budget film it IS entertaining.

My Grade: C+

DVD Extras: "Gerorisuto" short film; Interview with Shozin Fukui; Photo gallery; Theatrical Trailer; Trailers for "Electric Dragon 80000V", and "Junk"

Surprising result. Such a surprising result. Such a surprising result. Such a surprising result.

This does for corporate research science what 'Texas Chainsaw Massacre' does for inbred hillbillies. It is a film about psychic warfare that makes David Cronenberg's 'Scanners' seem ineffectual. Tho I don't like Rubber's Lover as much as Fukui's other feature, '964 Pinocchio,' it is certainly remarkable. What makes this film chilling to the bone is not the strange technology depicted or the spooky black & white cinematography or the creepy narrative ambiguities, tho this all adds. It is the screaming, hysterical, overblown performances by the actors which really gives the impression of terrible violence. Tho there is a decent amount of physical splatter in this film, the real gore is psychological. Try this film. you'll feel like a rhesus monkey in a head trauma experiment, and you'll like it!

This is another one in a long line of typical Japanese black-and-white film-student-project-gone-wrong pretentious wannabe-deep-but-it's-not pseudo-surrealistic piece of crap masquerading as "disturbing horror." A never-ending bout of morons screaming for no reason and just "freaking out" is what you are in for with this film.

Of course, any movie like this will attract countless reviews speaking of how "briliant" the director is, how "disturbing" the film's "message" was (bwhahaha!) and a long string of steamy nuggets of self-delusional insight, but what it comes down to is this: low budget black and white boring inanity with lots of stupid screaming that will bore you to the verge of tears.

If you're looking for an actual movie with plot that will entertain you, this is not it.

If Rubber's Lover was meant to be understood and fully appreciated, It fell short. I was intrigued by the camera angles, technological props, and trying to find the storyline. This cyberpunk, art house, music video type spectacle, tired me out and seemed a lot longer than the posted 91 minutes. After considerable attempts to understand this movie, I surrendered. If I was at the theater, I would have left early. This movie brings up memories of David Lynch's Eraserhead and Croenenberg's Scanners. If this was a film school assignment in which the assignment was to make the weirdest movie you can think up, this was probably the winner. Not my thing, maybe yours.