Sex & Fury. by Norifumi Suzuki (1973). R1 USA DVD Review.

The Story :

Toughie. It's a vengeance or revenge movie at its heart. There are light comedy moments and lots of dialogue in there that sometimes strays into unnecessary territory so it's not as clear cut as if it had been a little more carefully balanced out . Something tells me 'vengeance' is the word that will prick-up a few more ears around these parts after some of the films to be made and to re-emerge in recent years. Also, let the Reiko Ike mini-revivial begin as, like Meiko Kaji, here's a saucy lady not afraid to get naked or violent, or to mix the two in very copious amounts for the sake of a bit of entertainment. Very solid performance and a great character that's only a little obscured by the others in the narrative. Now I have to sit down and watch Suzukis' other Reiko Ike movie, 'School of the Holy Beast' sometime soon.

The Lady :

Reiko Ike plays Ocho Inoshika, who as a young girl witnesses the slaughter of her Detective father, and later, as a street criminal, promises to rescue the sister of a dying fellow gambler from a life in prostitution. Here's where the heavy mix of nudity, female flesh (for the very large part), and the gushing of bright red blood at the hands of (primarily) Ocho and a select few other creates a movie that's a much a mix of those two familiar elements as I've ever seen. Strong and superbly beautiful, Ocho lets no difficult situation, no individual or distance stop her from he aims. Lack of clothing does not hold her back, and even when she is wearing it we might soon see it disappear; the same goes for lots of the other women that make up a relatively large range of characters. Bit of a male fantasy movie, yes, but it's somehow given a certain amount of justification, though it is an exploitation movie at its heart I suppose. Oh, and It's only the men who manage to stay relatively covered.

The Themes :

Around this initial theme of a rescue is wrapped the main emerging story, the vengeance. Ocho begins to be in a position to meet those who are revealed to be those responsible for her fathers slaughter (known respectively as 'The Boar', 'The Bear' and 'The Butterfly' (i think, could be 'The Deer and not 'The Bear', anyhow : three killers not one) - ex-Yakuza in positions of power, with similar lifestyles and behaviour that reveal those Yakuza roots). There's no 'one person, one crime' scenario, as to complicate things it was all a team effort, so it takes here the duration of the movie to seek them out and exact her revenge in glorious technicolor and in a variety of ways, with very well composed moments of slow motion photography, jaunty angles, and sometimes hellishly vibrant colors. Strangely trippy as well as certainly familiarly straight-forward in sections too.

The Characters :

In order to flesh out the story, maybe taking it all out of the realms of 'less is more', there are several smaller characters and sub-plots. Unfortunately, I was either distracted or let down by the jump between sparse scenes and those scenes with lots of dialogue, and I found keeping track of it all a little difficult. The characters, other than Ocho, are not as interesting as they could be if they were played a little more mysteriously - unfortunately they also seemed to distract from Ocho and her much more dynamic and well constructed strand of the story as they're not entirely fleshed-out and convincing as she manages to be within her share of the screen time.

Christina Lindberg (here appearing in a film a whole year before 'Thriller : A Cruel Picture', in a film on an entirely different continent that has similar themes and approach; that film has a great Autumnal feel to it that I am personally very keen on) is the element that breaks the illusion that the film constructs from all its others. She isn't exactly comfortable speaking English, let alone Japanese, and I can't help but feel it suggests that even Japanese dialogue from Japanese actors within the film might be as dodgy to the ears of those that originally sat in the theatre to watch this. Her boss, 'Guiness' is also a Westerner with similar language problem. A pet hate of mine really, mixed languages. She is definitely more comfortable when naked and relatively silent. Still, it does nothing but show slight cracks in an otherwise very well constructed film.

The Writing :

Script is a little unpolished, but in the end its the visual effect of the overall film that raises it up into something that's very memorable - could be a little better balanced, and even though it's somewhat 50/50 action and dialogue, its the transition between the two thats odd. Very reminiscent of 'Lady Snowblood' for varying reasons, and perhaps the dialogue is heavier here because of the introduction of characters that could be to distract from its similarities to that particular film. Sometimes though, it's very obvious 'inspired by', other times 'a blatant rip-off' of that particularly impressive movie - oddly, both 'Lady Snowblood' and 'Sex & Fury' are 1973 movies, with the later coming out in February of that year : so one before the other either way around still will still make them appear similar in many respects. No bad thing, a very good source of inspiration or great to be regarded as similar however the relationship actually occurs, and certainly a more extreme example here of a similar storyline. Story is not necessarily original or ground breaking, but it's interesting and reasonably layered. Probably many more films that I could see now which I would also be able to compare to 'Lady Snowblood', truth be told I can't say if its a direct relationship between these two films or a very common theme I happen to have seen two example of (if not more, actually).

The Production :

Amongst it all, it's driving force infact, is all the saucy sex action (acres of it) and the violent sword and knife fights (slightly less of this, but not too little), gushing blood and beautiful environments. Snowy gardens, ballrooms, bedrooms; all familiar and all made to look very unusual for the most part. There is a balance between the surreal angles and colours, along with the more relatively straight forward camera work that doesn't make things too odd or difficult to watch, and ultimately makes for a pretty well balanced production.

Overall effect is a very familiar buzzing in the brain and eyes, making the evening feel like it was spent eating sugar from a bowl with a spoon. Still burnt firmly into my retinas this morning too. Suzukis' Direction utilises very familiar techniques for low-budget films makers, and manages to make them work in an individual style. The camera is used dynamically, the scenes often very brightly coloured, and the general production feeling is very solid. Some of the sections in the story aren't effectively explained (there's a cardgame that looks rehearsed ineffectively, and I couldn't follow the flow of the game rules; that's one example of perhaps many), and at least to an ignorant Western audience (i.e, me, i suppose) some additional confusion beyond the scripts failings are to be found in how Suzuki manages to portray the story.

Musically there's a theme tune with a very 70s style (infact there's intentional use of things that represent different points in time, the film being set in the early 20th century and some of the clothing and music clearly contemporary). We get acoustic guitar, violin (some orchestration), bongos, firm drum sounds for the most part - couple of faux Jimmy Hendrix (but slower) rock pieces towards the end. Nicely done, works well, and only adds to the oddness of it all.

The DVD :

Certainly not perfection, but those elements that take it away from that are either beyond anyones control and (to be honest) hardly bare mentioning. You would have to have your ear next to the speakers and your magnifying glass out looking at every millimetre of the the screen to spot the very subtle flaws that very rarely show. Overall, a wonderful mastering of sound and image for an old and low budget film. Sound is mono, contains a little background noise if you listen in at times (I was wearing headphones though). There's incredibly brief and very difficult to minute spot patches as the film print runs through on perhaps one or two sub-one second moments. Generally, its almost literally ten times better than examples put out by companies with bigger and longer established reputations.

The disc may only carry very familiar extras in poster and image galleries, trailer and biogs, but the packaging is imaginative, the menus well considered and easy to use (if a little slow to operate, and sometimes the text is hard to read), but the general feel one of quality and attention to detail. All the film titles listed in the text elements only has me hoping for much more of the same very soon.

I suppose many labels prove themselves to be able to turn out the odd great disc. The overall level of effort that you sense from watching the film and taking in the extras, the packaging (nice design, not so well executed), the writing (a little familiar, still manages to flesh out the intricacies of the story) involved leave me with the impression that Panik House will be set amongst a select few labels regarded as willing and able to do such films the justice they deserve. My eyes are firmly watching what for what they turn up next and how they manage to present those films. As impressive a disc as you could hope for out of any company.

Overall :

Great little film, oddly familiar, very memorable. Recommended if you know a similar movie (of which there are still few example in the USA on DVD) that you enjoyed : something with huge amounts of swordplay / nudity like 'Lady Snowblood', 'Lone Wolf and Cub', 'Female Convict Scorpion' and so on - in this films lies those elements in a different balance and not entirely as successful, no less recommended. Beautiful disc, a little low on extras (though I am personally, for the most part, only interested in more films and not more background information), that does the film a good service as I had hoped. Very impressive in all regards.

Worth mentioning that Japanese film blogs and DVD retailers have been looking forward to these and giving them nicely designed dedicated page - see, we don't always get the rough end of the deal...!

'Sex and Fury' Trailer (Quicktime Download Small (11.7 Mb), Large (22.4 Mb)).

'Sex & Fury' at IMDB (in English) / JMDB (in Japanese).
The original title in Japanese, just in case : 不良姐御伝　猪の鹿お蝶 - this American R1 DVD was released September 27th 2005.

Panik House Official Website (in English).

Interview with Panik House President Matthew Kennedy.

Norifumi Suzuki (Director) at IMDB / JMDB.