The Non-Synapse Roman Porno Thread

[Maito Guy]

Hah! I was once watching Katsuhiko Fujii films just to see if I'd ever find a movie that I don't hate (1/5). And I did find that film: Catholic Nun's Rope Hell (1.5/5). That was Fujii film no. 9 for me.

(I did not see Blazing Bondage Lady, though)

I'm continuing on this quest right now .. sometimes Roman Pornos can be quite a torture to get through, lol

I think that the quality of his output can differ quite drastically from film to film, but that's an attribute most certainly valid for the bulk of Roman Porno directors, even the most celebrated ones. In my opinion this is a consequence of the program picture system still in place at Nikkatsu during that time which forced directors to work together with certain scriptwriters and producers. Sometimes these collaborations result into masterpieces, most are average and quite a lot are just bad movies also, but at least the masterpieces can shine even more within the loads of average and bad work ^_^

I really like Fujii's DAN ONIROKU: BEAUTY ROPE MAKEUP and DAN ONIROKU: BRIDAL DOLL (which I just saw yesterday, review below). Also quite enjoyed MOMOE'S LIPS, which got a US release by Synapse.

Speaking of hate, I saw Blue Beast: Secret Pleasure in 35mm some years ago and absolutely hated it

I thought it was ok. The main character is annoying, but his parents (especially the father) rescued this one for me.

Dan Oniroku: Bridal Doll (Dan oniroku: Hanayome ningyou; Fujii Katsuhiko, 6.10.1979) - 4/5
This was the first SM Roman Porno after Tani Naomi's retirement and features the wonderful Kurayoshi Asako (CLIMAX SISTERS: DESCEND) in which must be her only SM role.

The movie is quite abstract and bare to the bones, shows some artistic ambitions and even manages to ask a view interesting questions regarding SM and its perception from both sides of participants and even from outside viewers. Beautifully shot in cinemascope with a perfectly fitting Soundtrack this is definitely one of the better entries in the Dan Oniroku series directed by Fujii Katsuhiko.

The script could have used a rewriting, tightening things up a bit, especially toward the end of the movie and one could complain that in the end the film doesn't amount to much due to it being really bare to the bones storywise. That said somehow both things didn't bother me much during my viewing and I'd certainly consider this worthwhile to watch.











Dan Oniroku: Office Lady Rope Slave (Dan oniroku: OL nawa dorei; Fujii Katsuhiko, 23.1.1981) - 3/5
Another one featuring Mabuki Junko and quite a sleazefest. Man, watching the trailer alone made me seriously question wether I really want to view this one or not. In the end it was actually more fun than I expected in the first place.

Mabuki Junko plays a snotty office lady working in a bank. She has an affair with one of the lower ranked bank managers who of course throws her away for his wife and career. “Lucky” she gets captured and tortured the same night by a guy she let down earlier. After finally ending up enjoying her treatment (of course, what else) she sets out for revenge on her boss together with her torturers.

Some of the stuff in this one is so over the top that it actually is rather funny than disturbing in the end. One of the torturers is an elder man who plays a fairytale writer in the film. I'm not sure about it but I think his character could be seen as a parody of Dan Oniroku. His performance and his lines are so over the top and perverse at times I ended up laughing quite a bit. Not sure wether that was intentioned that way though ;-)

[Takuma]

Hah! I was once watching Katsuhiko Fujii films just to see if I'd ever find a movie that I don't hate (1/5). And I did find that film: Catholic Nun's Rope Hell (1.5/5). That was Fujii film no. 9 for me.

(I did not see Blazing Bondage Lady, though)

Speaking of hate, I saw Blue Beast: Secret Pleasure in 35mm some years ago and absolutely hated it

[Maito Guy]

I also (once again) got me a one month membership at the DMM Pink channel because they had one of their sales. Decided to get in a few unseen Fujii Katsuhiko movies after my positive surprise with BLAZING BONDAGE LADY .. probably not the best decision :(

Beautiful Sisters Flesh Salve (Bijimai nikudorei; Fujii Katsuhiko, 18.1.1986) - 1/5
Completely forgettable rape/torture themed late Roman Porno by director Fujii Katsuhiko whose films quality ranges from utter shit over great genre exercises up to serious art. This one falls into the first category. Minimal story just as an excuse for a string of sex scenes mixed with bad acting and seemingly no budget at all. Here and there at least Fujii manages to get in a beautiful shot.









Cruelty: Black Rose Slave (Zankoku: Kurobara dorei; Fujii Katsuhiko, 26.4.1975) - 2/5
One of the earlier Roman Porno adaptions of a Dan Oniroku novel helmed by Director Fujii Katsuhiko featuring Tani Naomi in the main role. Set in the war era this one begins relatively promising but clearly suffers from a weak script. The film loses its drive completely after the first 15 minutes with not a single character's motivation being clear or comprehensible. The sex scenes are incredibly boring and for a Dan Oniroku adaption quite shockingly tame, even compared to other Roman Pornos.





Female Teacher's Awakening (Onnakyoushi no mezame; Fujii Katsuhiko, 15.5.1981) - 1/5
Just as bad as BEAUTIFUL SISTERS FLESH SLAVES minus the beautiful shots here and there this entry in the FEMALE TEACHER series of director Fujii Katsuhiko must be one of the worst I've seen out of them. The script is a complete joke whose only reason for existence is once again to string together one forgettable sex scene after another. A dog is also featured in some of the more tasteless of them.

[Maito Guy]

Dan Oniroku: Blazing Bondage Lady (Dan oniroku: Jouen fujin; Fujii Katsuhiko, 20.9.1980) - 4/5
More or less randomly picked this one out of the SM-themed Roman Pornos I haven't seen yet due to not being able to decide which one would suck less and lucky me ended up picking one of those rare gems :-)

Directed by Fujii Katsuhiko featuring actress Mabuki Junko (dealt as second Tani Naomi after her retirement in the late 70ies) BLAZING BONDAGE LADY is a perfect example of how to make a Dan Oniroku adaption worthwile.

The movie is basically a revenge drama. Mabuki Junko's character is married to a salaryman going a bit too far on one of his business trips and she ends up getting wind up into a stream of sex, SM, revenge and violence.

What makes this one particularly great are interesting characters with clear motivations and even some development and arcs throughout the movie. Quite an achievement considering the length and number of sex scenes featured. The movie is also beautifully shot with lots of great nature shots. Soundtrack is on point too and most of the performances are quite good also.













Dan Oniroku: Female Beautician Rope Discipline (Dan oniroku: Onna byoushi nawa shiiku; Ito Hidehiro, 27.11.1981) - 2/5
After my positive surprise with BLAZING BONDAGE LADY this one was quite a horror to get through. Directed by Ito Hidehiro, one of the assistance directors who got promoted director in the late 70ies / early 80ies FEMALE BEAUTICIAN ROPE DISCIPLINE also features Mabuki Junko alongside the beautiful Shima Izumi and is a perfect example of how NOT to make a Dan Oniroku adaption.

Sex scene after sex scene with weak performances tight together by a script in which every single female character ends up loving to get tied up and tortured. That said there are even worse Dan Oniroku adaptions within the Roman Porno world which sadly doesn't make this one more enjoyable either.

[Maito Guy]

Graceful Beasts (Shinayaka na kemonotachi; Kato Akira, 9.2.1972)
Watched this early Roman Porno directed by Kato Akira lately, who is one of the more underrated Roman Porno directors in my opinion. He actually got his directing debut at the end of the Nikkatsu Action era with the third and best entry in the GIRLS' JUNIOR HIGH SCHOOL series and continued to work for Nikkatsu until almost the very end of Roman Porno in the 80ies. I consider his two relative early efforts FEMALE STUDENT WIFE: SOBBING (1972) and LOVE MAKES ME WET (1973) to be his best work, but still haven't seen all of his quite immense output, and maybe also am forgetting a few other good ones ^_^

GRACEFUL BEASTS wasn't on par with his best work, but still worth watching. It's a mix of coming of age film with Yakuza film elements, but takes too much time before getting really interesting. Tanaka Mari plays the female lead in this one alongside Yamashina Yuri and maybe the earliest appearance of Tani Naomi within Roman Porno (not entirely sure about this though).







Blue Beast: Secret Pleasure (Aoi kemono: hisoka na tanoshimi; Takeda Kazunari, 9.9.1978)
After ending up quite impressed by ENGULFED IN DARKNESS I decided to check out a few other works of director Takeda, which I haven't watched before. This is about a young high school student preparing for his entry exams for Tokyo University and slowly but surely going nuts due to all the learning. Quite ok, but by far not as good as WOMAN'S TRAIL: WET PATH and ENGULFED IN DARKNESS. Best and in my opinion also central part of the movie is the father of our main character who not only ends up getting beat up by his son, but also betrayed by his wife, which also is the reason for him being impotent. He is played by the same actor who also played the father role in the wonderful FEMALE TEACHER: DIRTY AFTERNOON by Negishi Kichitaro.







Room of Shame (Chijoku no heya; Takeda Kazunari, 19.11.1982)
The second Ikeda-directed movie I watched got shot right after ENGULFED IN DARKNESS also starring the wonderful Kazamatsuri Yuki as lead actress and wife of an (once again) impotent husband, who, not being able to satisfy his wife's needs kind of arranges affairs with three of his working colleagues for her. The film is basically a comedy, with most of the more "dramatic" elements played for laughs. The ending is quite bittersweet though. I certainly liked this one, and would even say that Kazamatsuri Yuki is a bit better here than in ENGULFED IN DARKNESS, but overall it lacks the dramatic drive of its predecessor and also the comedy didn't work that well for me here (still a lot better than most of the other Roman Porno comedies though).







That's it as of right now. I'm also currently going though lots of still unwatched SM-themed Roman Pornos which I have left here hoping to find a few hidden gems within them. So prepare for some reviews. Tried to avoid these up until now but I guess someone has to get the work on them done sometime

[Maito Guy]

You have been sorely missed. I hope you find more time to post!



Glad to hear that. I'm thinking about seeing this at Cine Roman later this month... I'll be town for a Teruo Ishii retro and need to kill some time. But I have never been to that theater (they are very much a "pink theater" and rarely screen anything that interests me) and I have no idea about the screening formats. Hopefully 35mm but who knows...

Thanks! Definitely will try to post more again :-)

ENGULFED IN DARKNESS gets a recommendation from me. It's not perfect, but really good. I maybe even like it more than WOMAN'S TRAIL: WET PATH. Have fun at the Teruo Ishii retro!! Would love to see some of his stuff on 35mm one day. Wasn't really lucky the last time I was in Tokyo with any good screenings, but am planning to get there again this summer, so maybe I'll be able to catch a few nice screenings then.

I achieved another life goal: watched a Roman Porno (*) with my girlfriend. As I had planned, I chose Delicate Skillful Fingers (1972). She seemed to like it more or less, certainly didn't hate it.

That's quite an achievement .. maybe one day ..

Btw, Nippon Connection will be holding a small Roman Porno retro with 9 titles.
http://www.nipponconnection.com/retro-en.html

Nice, but I'm not terribly impressed with that line-up. In addition to quality, the cool thing about Roman Porno was its diversity. There could be anything from a pink giallo to a cop thriller to a rock band docu-drama... That diversity is very much missing from Nippon Connection's selection which consists of 9 dramas from 2 directors...

Thought briefly about going there since it's really near and cheap to get there from Vienna by plane, but as you said the lineup is quite disappointing. The chosen movies are certainly good and would be nice to catch on 35mm, but I'd also preferred a bit more diversity. There are so many more interesting movies and directors within Roman Porno completely ignored, especially in the west. Rather save me the money for Japan this summer ^_^

From this selection I recently rewatched "World of Geisha" by Kumashiro and after having watched many other ropo's, I don't get why it has been so highly regarded by the critics at the time of its release... quite good but not that great, especially if compared to other films in the genre...

On the same page with you on this one. It certainly has its moments but there are far better ones out there. Also within Kumashiro's oeuvre I'd consider this a lesser one.

[tetrapak]

Btw, Nippon Connection will be holding a small Roman Porno retro with 9 titles.
http://www.nipponconnection.com/retro-en.html

Nice, but I'm not terribly impressed with that line-up. In addition to quality, the cool thing about Roman Porno was its diversity. There could be anything from a pink giallo to a cop thriller to a rock band docu-drama... That diversity is very much missing from Nippon Connection's selection which consists of 9 dramas from 2 directors...

From this selection I recently rewatched "World of Geisha" by Kumashiro and after having watched many other ropo's, I don't get why it has been so highly regarded by the critics at the time of its release... quite good but not that great, especially if compared to other films in the genre...

[Takuma]

I achieved another life goal: watched a Roman Porno (*) with my girlfriend. As I had planned, I chose Delicate Skillful Fingers (1972). She seemed to like it more or less, certainly didn't hate it.

For me it was the second time seeing it. Some poor acting by Hiroko Isayama and Hajime Tanimoto aside, it's such a good film. So many fantastic scenes (the shower room party, Isayama and Araki's first meeting, all the pick pocketing scenes, the vivid early 70s Tokyo footage...), absolutely wonderful score and a cool as hell Ichiro Araki performance. Wow!

* We did see Wet Woman in the Wind in theatre, but that's a Reboot film, a bit different hence...

Btw, Nippon Connection will be holding a small Roman Porno retro with 9 titles.
http://www.nipponconnection.com/retro-en.html

Nice, but I'm not terribly impressed with that line-up. In addition to quality, the cool thing about Roman Porno was its diversity. There could be anything from a pink giallo to a cop thriller to a rock band docu-drama... That diversity is very much missing from Nippon Connection's selection which consists of 9 dramas from 2 directors...

[Takuma]

Hey, still reading a lot here on the forum, but didn't really have time to post anything as of lately. Hope this will get better again!

You have been sorely missed. I hope you find more time to post!

A small little film perfectly showing the capabilities of the Roman Porno genre.

Glad to hear that. I'm thinking about seeing this at Cine Roman later this month... I'll be town for a Teruo Ishii retro and need to kill some time. But I have never been to that theater (they are very much a "pink theater" and rarely screen anything that interests me) and I have no idea about the screening formats. Hopefully 35mm but who knows...

I sort of hope the discs will be from somewhat older interlaced scans so that way they might actually present them without too much filtering and original colors. :P

Same here. I don't know what the hell Nikkatsu is trying to do with the new transfers. Make em look like Michael Bay films?

The problem is painfully evident with the DVD-only titles. The old Geneon discs had much better transfers...

(though who knows what the original is...)

I do I've seen Red Classroom from an excellent 35mm print.

Do I remember exactly how it looks like? No. Do I need to? No. The big secret is (despite some conspiracy theories at BD.com forums and elsewhere) 97% of the 60s and 70s Japanese films have the roughly same overall look, that is colorful but pretty natural (not counting scenes where odd colors are used as a special effect). It's very easy to remember the rare exceptions. Red Classroom was not an exception.

I have lost all hope (about everything...).

[Sundance]

This whole Angel Guts boxset thing feels kinda stupid when the first film is not included.

I sort of hope the discs will be from somewhat older interlaced scans so that way they might actually present them without too much filtering and original (though who knows what the original is...) colors. :P

Maybe the involvement of Ishii will make them not fuck this up. Or maybe Ishii wants to make his film look different and since it is a series and all the other directors are dead, they will fuck up the rest as well... ;)

I have lost all hope (about everything...).

[Maito Guy]

Engulfed By Darkness (Yami ni dakarete; Takeda Kazunari, 26.2.1986)

Not posting much lately but still watching Roman Porno and also Nikkatsu Action flicks on a regular basis. Caught this late one by Takeda Kazunari just a few days ago and was quite impressed by it. Takeda also directed the superb WOMAN'S TRAIL: WET PATH (Onna no hosomichi: Nureta kaikyo, 1982) which also found a place in Takuma's top list (great list by the way!) and the HOUSEWIFE'S REPORT trilogy in the mid 70ies, which I have yet to see. The movie has a great script by Takada Jun who also wrote the PINK CURTAIN trilogy and features the incredible talented as well as beautiful Kazamatsuri Yuki in one of her best roles. She seems to stare quite often as a single working woman, so of course also in this one.

Mieko (Kazamatsuri Yuki) shares a household together with her female friend/working colleague Ayako who has a relationship with a married man called Honma. After getting caught and confronted by Honma's wife Ayako ends up on a trip to Ejima with another guy trying to commit double suicide various times. Mieko and Honma warned by a telephone call by Ayako herself the same night she leaves go on a trip to Ejima themselves to find and rescue her.

The movie consists completely out of four characters:Mieko, Ayako, Honma and Ayako's double suicide partner. While the story itself follows quite standard melodramatic tropes the characters and their relationships to each other is what makes this little one quite worthwhile in my opinion. All four are completely realized characters seeming not only very real but also are given very distinct and interesting personalities. On top of that comes some great directing by Takeda who really shines in some quiet, almost nonrelevant seeming scenes which end up telling much about the characters, their respective hopes and dreams and relationships to each other within just a few shots and cuts.

A small little film perfectly showing the capabilities of the Roman Porno genre.

[Maito Guy]

I've been wanting to see FEMALE DELINQUENT: A DOCU-DRAMA ever since I read in Weisser's book that it's based on an infamous real life delinquent chick. But who knows with Weisser since I heard that its riddled with errors with half truths. Btw, do you know anything about this Shinichi Shiratori RP from 1982? It's romanized as ONNA JIMUIN -- what's the English translation of the title? features one of the biggest stars of the era in Maiko Kazama. Pretty standard fare till the gang rape near the end complete with some sleaze ball taking photos of the proceedings. Where's Maito guy of late? He seems to be the resident RP expert around these parts -- maybe he has further info?

Hey, still reading a lot here on the forum, but didn't really have time to post anything as of lately. Hope this will get better again!

As for ONNA JIMUIN, I'm sorry but I don't know anything about it. Haven't seen it and I don't really plan on doing so anywhere in near future (have to admit that I didn't quite enjoy most of the other films I saw from Shinichi Shiratori).

That artwork be looking like shit for real. Do you know how much this set us going to be priced? I know it's not going to be cheap like most jap releases. I wouldn't mind eventually picking it up just to make some custom BD-Rs with English subs.

The set is currently available to preorder from Amazon Japan for about 14,000 Yen (should equal about 120-130 US Dollar). But I guess you'd have to add quite some shipping and import costs due to Amazon Japan not directly sending any adult-oriented movies to anywhere outside of Japan: Angel Guts Boxset Amazon JP

That said I really dig these artworks and have this currently on preorder. Looking especially forward to the commentaries by Ishii which alone are worth this release for me. Only real disappointment for me was that the first one is not included, but I guess hope is lost there anyway, at least in near future.

[47lab]

That artwork be looking like shit for real. Do you know how much this set us going to be priced? I know it's not going to be cheap like most jap releases. I wouldn't mind eventually picking it up just to make some custom BD-Rs with English subs.

[enandalusiskhund]

I actually like that Angel Guts artwork. Only wish the Japanese would sub their releases in English.

[Takuma]

Angel Guts Artworks







- http://www.nikkatsu-romanporno.com/t...017/04/bd4.php

Can't say I'm impressed. And seeing how Nikkatsu's recent RP transfers have turned out, I'm fearing the worst for the transfers too...