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context: movies > some films
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In the Realm of the Senses
1976. Original title: Ai No Corrida. Director: Nagisa Oshima. Starring: Tatsuya Fuji, Eiko Matsuda.
Oshima's most famous, or indeed notorious, film was Ai No Corrida or In The Realm Of The Senses, from 1976. This broke almost every censorship law Japan had and, last I heard, had still not been shown there genuinely uncut (I believe there is at least one cut in the DVD I have, too). It features hardcore sex and horrific mutilation - but it's also a powerfully beautiful movie, carefully designed and shot. It is more radical than, say, Last Tango In Paris, which it parallels in many ways, both in its explicitness and its sociopolitical agenda, which is extremely critical of Japanese society. It has its problems: despite clear intentions to show women as powerful, it succumbs to some misogynist ideas or habits; and if wider political criticisms are intended than those about sex, repression and the like, as a few scenes suggest, these are insufficiently integrated. Nonethless, it's a film of extraordinary power even over 30 years later, and still challenging to watch and understand.