Modern Pulp

September 12 2020

HAKUJITSUMU WRESTLING

Tetsuji Takechi comes out swinging hard in round two.

This poster was made for Hakujitsumu, aka Daydream, which premiered in Japan today in 1981. The movie is loosely based on a 1926 novel by Junichir Tanizaki, which director Tetsuji Takechi made into one of the first pinku films in 1964. The same director felt inspired to put together a porno remake and, blazing a trail once again, it was the first hardcore movie to be shown in Japanese cinemas. We wanted to see what Takechi did with his revision so we watched it, and it sets up pretty much the same way as the first movie, with KyÅko Aizome at her dentist’s office, the dentist and his assistant administering gas, then both taking liberties once Aizome is helpless. The action is witnessed by another patient, who follows Aizome around town as she has a series of erotic interludes that spiral off into quasi reality designed to sow doubt concerning whether any of it really happened.

We can’t say the hardcore action here is highly erotic, but certain non-sex sequences get there, including Aizome’s nude hotel escape, and her naked lathering and rinse inside a car wash. Not that we’re down on hardcore. It’s just that we insist everything be made to look beautiful. In the sex scenes Takechi, seeking to prove that the action was indeed real, went anatomical. It’s an understandable choice—if you can finally show it, why not show it, nutsacks, assholes, milky fluids and all? But even though we’re from the generation that is supposed to reflexively love explicit hardcore, we’re old souls, and particularly appreciate porn where we know it’s real but don’t see everything (maybe Aizome felt the same way—she directed her own remake in 2009). Regardless of the success or failure of Hakujitsumu, anytime we see the phrase “the first film that…” we’re fully on board. Now we can say we saw the first Japanese film that went hardcore. That’s something, at least. Below, Aizome inspires daydreams, and you can see more from her here.

Japan, Hakujitsumu, Tetsuji Takechi, Kyōko Aizome, poster art, cinema, pinku, nudity, movie review, xxx

Vintage Pulp

June 21 2020

DAYDREAM BELIEVER

If you're going to have a fantasy make it a doozy.

We have two exceptionally beautiful Japanese posters today. These were made for Hakujitsumu, known in English as Daydream. That’s an unusually concise Japanese title, but this won’t be a concise post. The movie is loosely based on a 1926 novel by Junichir Tanizaki, and was one of the first films classified as pinku eiga, as well as one of the first erotic productions to have a big budget and a run in mainstream cinemas. It also played outside Japan, with a screening at the 1964 Venice Festival and a release in Stateside cinemas. And because of its success, director Tetsuji Takechi remade the film in hardcore style, not once, but twice, in 1981 and 1987, both times starring Kyōko Aizome, who we’ve talked about before.

The premise of this is fascinating. Akira Ishihama meets Kanako Michi in their dentist’s waiting room. Later, as both of them are receiving anesthesia, Ishihama looks over and sees—because apparently Japanese dentistry meant placing two patients into the same room—the dentist and a nurse strip Michi, then seemingly suck her blood like vampires. Was it an anesthetic dream, or a real occurrence? Ishihama needs to uncover the truth. He goes to a nightclub where Michi sings, sees the dentist approach her and demand that she leave with him. Ishihama follows—or actually sort of teleports after them—and later sees Michi submit to various forms of kinky bondage. But is any of what he’s seeing real? The title of the film gives that away, doesn’t it?

We wonder if Hakujitsumu used the plot device of fantasy because it softened the idea of the bondage and weirdness Michi goes through. Well, all that would soon become routine in Japanese cinema. In addition this was the first Japanese film to show an actress fully naked—which happens for extended periods. Most write-ups say there’s even pubic hair shown, but we’ll admit we blinked and missed it if that was the case. What we didn’t miss was what a clear precursor to the pinku genre of roman porno Hakujitsumu is. Here those elements seem novel; by the 1970s, they wouldn’t be, and as a result filmmakers were by then pushing the envelope with violence, water sports, and enemas. That envelope could have stayed flat, as far as we’re concerned. Hakujitsumu premiered in Japan today in 1964.

Japan, Italy, Venice Film Festival, Daisan Productions, Hakujitsumu, Daydream, Tetsuji Takechi, Junichir Tanizaki, Akira Ishihama, Kanako Michi, Kyōko Aizome, poster art, cinema, sexploitation, pinku, movie review

Modern Pulp

June 16 2017

G WHIZ

If it's there you can bet we'll find it.

Above you see a poster for Aizome Kyôko: G no kaikan, aka Kyôko Aizome’s G-spot Pleasure, with Kyôko Aizome (not to be confused with Kyoko Izumi) fronting the art. Aizome goes way back. She appeared in her first film in 1975, but this particular effort premiered in Japan today in 2000, when she was forty-two. Though it’s a comparatively recent production we were not able to track down a copy, which when you think about it is apropos, considering science says g-spots don’t really exist. We’re pro-science guys, but a lot of women say there’s a real piece of anatomy in there, and a dedicated search often turns something up—if only the woman’s heart rate. Aizome, below, suggests you give it a try.

Japan, Aizome Kyôko: G no kaikan, Kyôko Aizome's G-spot Pleasure, Kyōko Aizome, roman porno, pinku, poster art, cinema, nudity

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HISTORY REWIND

The headlines that mattered yesteryear.

November 11

1918—The Great War Ends

Germany signs an armistice agreement with the Allies in a railroad car outside of CompiÃ¨gne in France, ending The Great War, later to be called World War I. About ten million people died, and many millions more were wounded. The conflict officially stops at 11:00 a.m., and today the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month is annually honored in some European nations with two minutes of silence.

November 10

1924—Dion O'Banion Gunned Down

Dion O’Banion, leader of Chicago’s North Side Gang, is assassinated in his flower shop by members of rival Johnny Torrio’s gang, sparking the bloody five-year war between the North Side Gang and the Chicago Outfit that culminates in the St. Valentine’s Day Massacre.

November 10

1940—Walt Disney Becomes Informer

Walt Disney begins serving as an informer for the Los Angeles office of the FBI, with instructions to report on Hollywood subversives. He eventually testifies before HUAC, where he fingers several people as Communist agitators. He also accuses the Screen Actors Guild of being a Communist front.

November 9

1921—Einstein Wins Nobel

German theoretical physicist Albert Einstein is awarded the Nobel Prize for his work with the photoelectric effect, a phenomenon in which electrons are emitted from matter as a consequence of their absorption of energy from electromagnetic radiation. In practical terms, the phenomenon makes possible such devices as electroscopes, solar cells, and night vision goggles.

November 9

1938—Kristallnacht Begins

Nazi Germany’s first large scale act of anti-Jewish violence begins after the assassination of German diplomat Ernst vom Rath by Herschel Grynszpan. The event becomes known as Kristallnacht, and in total the violent rampage destroys more than 250 synagogues, causes the deaths of nearly a hundred Jews, and results in 25,000 to 30,000 more being arrested and sent to concentration camps.

November 8

1923—Hitler Stages Revolt

In Munich, Germany, Adolf Hitler leads the Nazis in the Beer Hall Putsch, an unsuccessful attempt to overthrow the German government. Also known as the Hitlerputsch or the Hitler-Ludendorff-Putsch, the attempted coup was inspired by Benito Mussolini’s successful takeover of the Italian government.

November 8

1932—Roosevelt Unveils CWA

U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt unveils the Civil Works Administration, an organization designed to create temporary winter jobs for more than 4 million of the unemployed.