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Review

Takahisha Zeze's Tokyo X Erotica follows the romance, death and subsequent resurrection of two lovers in the 1990s Japan. Shot on digital video, the film has the look and feel of an art school film project with all the expected camera tricks and convoluted plotline. There's an excessive amount of compelling if unsettling imagery as well as copious amounts of raunchy sex, sure to please any fan of sexy Asian girls. The digital recording and low budget lends an almost voyeuristic aspect to the film. Many of the sex scenes are so graphic, the actors so natural looking and the settings so realistic that at times, they register as actual amateur sex footage.

The pseudo-metaphysical question "What lasts longer, the time before birth or the time after death?" is asked throughout the film and becomes something of a running theme. This riddle is posed to Kenji by his ex Haruka, and is his last thought before death claims him. After his death, the cute Haruka moves on to become a prostitute, a career choice that will mean her untimely demise as well. We are treated to a graphic scene of male and female masturbation as she turns tricks for a man in a pink bunny costume who will go on to kill her. Or as Kenji's narration states, "Haruka died - or will die."

The film is a continuity nightmare, deteriorating into David Lynch-like ambiguity more than a few times, as the story jumps around to time periods before and after the couple's deaths usually with little or no warning. After the death of Haruka we flash back to a time when the couple is together offering more insight into their relationship and ensuing break up. Then we move on to "The time she is alive" and a scene involving a completely new and different couple, some bondage and a squirt gun full of semen. There doesn't seem to be any obvious connection to Kenji and Haruka, but it is an extremely racy and moving scene that offers a fascinating emotional character study. Later we are treated to a ménage a trios between a goofy teenage boy and two girls. Again, I have no idea what the connection is here. The dialogue in this scene is particularly amusing with such lines as "Awesome! This is awesome!" and "Great! Fantastic!" as the self-proclaimed "God of Death" pumps away and the girls moan and groan in ecstasy. In the final scene, the real "God of Death" clad in the familiar pink bunny costume, visits our doomed couple, twisting them and the viewer up one last time, savagely having his way with young Kenji.

At times heavy handed and arty, Tokyo X Erotica is balanced with heavy doses of nudity and cum shots. The purity and almost punk rock DIY ethos employed in the making of this work adds a spark of charm and innocence that would otherwise mark it as overtly preachy and self-important. While often confusing with its relentless obscuring of any real plot or character development, there is some sort of message to be gleamed out of the lurid mess. Every person has a right to live their life as they see fit, and that life can end or be ended as simply and as abruptly as it began.

Peajae Chaykin