Camera Japan Rotterdam 2023 Review: NEW RELIGION

Horror comes in different flavors, from fun slashers to controversial gore, but the Japanese have a decidedly special brand, with some very unsettling, creepy productions. Just over 20 years ago this brand became an international craze, after the worldwide breakthrough of the Grudge and Ring franchises. It also got a name: J-horror. But of course, within that brand there are many flavors as well, and while many films lean on jumpscares and black-haired ghosts, there are also the ones that, while devoid of big scares, manage to creep you out for days afterwards. That is a hard act to pull off successfully though, and besides Kurosawa Kiyoshi there aren't many directors who can properly do it. Enter Kondo Keishi, whose debut feature New Religion is an impressively decent entry in this field.

In New Religion we follow Miyabi, an escort working for a shady organisation. Years earlier, her daughter fell off a balcony and died while Miyabi was dozing off at her desk. This event led to Miyabi's husband leaving her, as he blamed her for the accident. Consumed with guilt, she cannot bear to sell the apartment where it happened, and she pays the rent with sex work.

Then one day she is sent to a strange customer who doesn't want to sleep with her. Instead, he asks to take a picture of her spine. Reluctantly, she agrees. Then he wants to photograph an arm. Next visit a leg. Miyami's pimp warns her to be careful: the work she does is illegal, so having your picture taken is unwise and against the rules. But Miyami notices something weird happening to her: after each session it seems as if she can communicate with her dead daughter, and her dreams in which they are together get more and more vivid. At the same time, she discovers that other people who have been photographed in this way become strange, violent... will the same thing happen to her?

Director Kondo lets his film burn slowly until you are in a cloud of smoke, waiting for fire. What exactly happens to the characters is up for interpretation, but that doesn't make the film any less creepy. What does get shown is how our interpretation of reality depends in part on memories, even memories of dreams. Every time Miyabi dozes off at her desk and wakes up, she runs to the balcony, hoping to see her daughter alive and that it was all a dream. Heartbreakingly, each repetition of this ritual only leads to renewed guilt and grief. When the stranger takes pictures of her, it changes things... but the whole process is so weird that you can't imagine this will end happily for Miyabi, whether she gets her daughter back or not.

Kondo Keishi's film is red, very red. Visually, people have compared it to (Argento's) Suspiria and Beyond the Black Rainbow. But Kondo doesn't use this as a gimmick, and he keeps his film visually interesting in other ways as well. And while New Religion is a grim look at coping with loss and grief, it is not an unsympathetic one. Actress Seto Kaho plays Miyabi as a believably broken person instead of a weepy victim, and Kondo livens things up enough so the film never descends into misery porn.

At the end, there was plenty to discuss with the people I saw it with. Indeed, days later I find myself still thinking of it. Is this a classic? No, but if Kondo Keishi ends up making classics, New Religion will go into history as the very promising debut which foretold this.