Sato's discussion on topics including immortality, reality and fantasy, pleasure and pain, take a more gore-soaked edge with this, the fifth film from his extensive back-catalogue to get an airing in America this year. Fantastic, more please...
I'm absolutely determined, to the point of possible repetition, to try to give these films (five so far this year by Director Hisayasu Sato released in America, including this one) a fair crack of the whip. Now, in order to do this, some familiar ground might be covered, that's for certain. My primary concern about these films is this : that it's more than obvious that Japanese films (as an example that I am most familiar with) are easily judged from Western perspectives, expectations, morality. Fine, it's easy to fall into that way of thinking, however conscious of the lack of justice offered to a film as a result, and I'm far from innocent of those charges either. Thing is, and this is particularly the case with the three Sato films issued by Artsmagic in recent months, that they're not being picked up on for reviews and I think there's both an issue from the companies perspective but I sense a more frequent and likely unintentional (or otherwise) dismissal of those Pink films as a result of the possibility of them being labeled too simplistically for their strong sexual content, as 'porn'.
Now, for me, with the rapid productivity of Japanese Cinema (or many sections of it at least), the lower budgets and smaller time scales for all aspects of production, there's far from a lack of ground to see covered, ideas to be explored, instead there's a sense of less conscious importance put on how well any given film is applicable to a large audience, a symptom of 'all things to everyone' film culture - instead, there's a sense of a reality that a film need apply to enough of an audience to maintain the cycle of work - and a subsequent natural, realistic approach to what subject matter lies within. Sexuality, far from being something so actively isolated and portrayed as beyond human control, almost animalistically in Western Societies, is acknowledged as a central aspect of human nature. In those pink films from Sato lies an admittedly extreme example, he's known for this and has been for many years, but there's a clear considered study always at the centre; common themes, varying approaches or results.
'Naked Blood', as it is more commonly remembered, although not a Pink film at its heart, is a Sato film through and through - it's known for it's gore aspects, not it's more obvious and central social studies which result in moments of admitedly extreme gore. Central to this particular story is the son of a widowed scientist, teenage prodigy Eiji (meaning 'Eternity's Son'), and his own secret studies and subsequent experimentation with his creation, the painkiller 'My Son' (or 'Myson' if you prefer). This gives the central aspect Sato seems to be discussing, the co-existence, the necessary balance between pleasure and pain.
Tip the balance too far, indeed eradicate one aspect (pain) and you're perverting the relationship between the two - pain becomes pleasure to such an extent that far from being an exercise in S&M it's a metaphorical study of the psychological effects of the two aspects and how they co-exist within life. Additionally, it's about how people must learn to accept one with the other, informing one another as they do. Here's where the extreme visuals come in, the cause of the moments this film is largely known for, but with which a distraction or dismissive cheapening of the films abilities come also. Now, if you're looking for gore, it's here and it's strong, but it's brief, it's a pay-off scenario, and it's through ignoring the more powerful and fascinating studies that you'll end up waiting for them. That would be a shame, there's far more substantial, fascinating and original ideas in here to be had, although not so clearly there and certainly not perfectly told (lacks some clarity, I think) there's more than blood on display, a whole lot more.
There's another larger, less clear aspect to the story as Sato discusses it. There's a memory of Eiji's father (also a scientist) and his search for eternal life. Now, there's a mention of 'Life is Light' or 'Light is Life' (essentially hints at the same thing) in his philosophy towards his work. The idea seems to be that all life, whether waking experience or dream-state (unconscious thought and influence) boils down to light, and so both technology and real-life have equal power over any given individual when reduced or understood in such a fashion, and this is used as a way of blending the gap between reality and fantasy in a plausible fashion. In this sense it's a very clinical, typically-Japanese, logically-led story that's more science-fiction than horror, and Eiji discovers, experiences a journey based around light through his use of technology (video camera in hand, study his blissfully-ignorant guinea pigs whom he has injected with 'My Son') both in isolation and in conjunction with one of the ladies his mother was experimenting on.
Several women are inadvertently involved in Eiji's work. One gains her greatest pleasure through eating (subsequent to her 'My Son' injection she turns her desires to consume upon herself - cannibalism, self-destruction ensue) and another is narcissistic (vain?) and discovers through piercing her ears that she's also suffering from the same side effect. The key isolation that highlights a desire to discuss the relationship between reality and fantasy, pleasure and pain, is the final lady - an insomniac who literally can't experience dreams (the pleasure in food, in vanity being the other waking dreams experienced here) so she is apparently not susceptible to risk of trying to fulfill them.
Centrally then, Sato is studying human nature, the psyche in familiar personal fashions, within different genres, to different ends. Here in 'Naked Blood' is a higher-quality (visually - seems to be shot on film, some high-end video perhaps) and more cinematic experience, but it's unmistakably from the same person responsible for what are so unfortunately easily-termed pornographic films (narratives with a strong sexual edge; far better to my mind) and subsequently get misrepresented and ignored. I personally think, as I have said before, there's great benefits in prolific, fast-turnaround films, a greater sense of reality and freedom to discuss that breaks an illusion that's so easy to fall for, and by applying western values to eastern culture without attempting to accept, find, study, interpret the potential alternative takes we're simply doing ourselves out of a great vein of material.
For those who've already seen Sato's 'Naked Blood' on the old Japan Shock DVD, this new presentation is sharper, has greater color (more natural and wider in range), and doesn't suffer from the background his on the sound. Although there's clearly limitations in budget, result, the films very impressive and more than a little reminiscent of Sato's more recent work, as found in his 'Caterpillar' section of the recent 'Rampo Noir' - one of the great films of the year, to my mind.