For as long as I can remember I’ve ached to see a bizarre Japanese horror film called Moju (Blind Beast) and now it’s here in Blu-ray thanks to Arrow Video in a beautiful widescreen uncut version. I remember salivating over the plot in Phil Hardy’s Encyclopedia of Horror years ago and getting reports of rare screenings in this country (in cities too far away to travel to) that only made me even more crazy to see it. But this is one of those rare times that it lives up to its reputation- and then some.
Made in 1969 by the father of Japanese new wave- Yasuzo Masumura– and based on a tale by legendary mystery writer Edogawa Rampo (say his name real fast to get the gag), it’s about a blind sculptor (Eiji Funakoshi), who with the help of his elderly mother, kidnaps a model (Mako Midori) and brings her to a warehouse way out in the country where his studio walls are lined with sculpted eyes, noses, lips, breasts and arms and two giant nude 60 foot women lay across the floor. The sculptor and model scramble across this Mount Rushmore of flesh and their relationship deteriorates further from artist and model, captor and prisoner, to willing sexual slave and master. Eventually madness and mutilation swallow them up whole.
Echoing later films like In the Realm of the Senses and foreshadowing Boxing Helena, this is a creepy, deliriously mad film- there is an elegance and simplicity of style that offsets the unsettling psychological violence of the subject. The sculptor is played by Eiji Funakoshi, who you might recognize from the sweet Japanese Gamera monster movies. Director Masumura’s other work has been just as elusive in this country but are equally whacked- such as Giants and Toys (1958) (Arrow Video has also released a gorgeous restored Blu-ray of this) about an advertising executive for a caramel company who uses a girl with bad teeth as their spokesperson, and Red Angel (1966) (available to watch online on MUBI) about an army nurse working during the Sino-Japanese war who sexually services the amputees. The transfer of Blind Beast is pretty terrific and the extras include an excellent introduction by Japanese cinema expert Tony Rayns, a visual essay by Seth Jacobowitz and a widescreen trailer of this demented film.
