Mukuro Trilogy (Japan, 2015) [DVD] - 3/5
A compilation of 3 short films by Katsumi Sasaki. The first short is called
Apartment Inferno and is about two sick fucks who specialize in corpse disposal. While one guy is clearly the seasoned leader, his young underling is new to the job and not quite ready for this kind of thing. Never less so then when he discovers that the corpse disposal also involves a woman chained up next to a toilet, who has to chop up the dead bodies and flush them down bit by bit. The second short is called
Sweet Home Inferno and deals with a family that has come under the influence of a new-agey guru. They become convinced that their teenaged problem child daughter is possessed by a demon and needs and exorcism - a ritualized beating that eventually goes even further. But not to worry, the guru tells them, the day of resurrection shall come... And so it does, as the previously dismembered daughter comes back from the dead as a superpowered zombie goddess and rips/blows everyone to pieces in what is a very obvious but nonetheless fun endictement of sectarian fanaticism and madness. The final short is called
Just Like A Mother and concerns a young mother and her daughter separating after the latter finishes school. Some time later the daughter gets a phone call telling her of an accident her mother's been in. But when she arrives at the address she was given she quickly discovers that her mother has been imprisoned by a trio of lowlife rapists, who feed her roadkill whenever they don't take turns raping her. Clearly the intention is to enlarge their rape-stable but unluckily for these dudes the mother snaps out of her catatonia and is quickly joined by her daughter in massacring the villains.
A common theme here is clearly the female protagonists that despite all the mistreatments they suffer always come out on top at the end. All three shorts run between 15 and 25 minutes and come with a rock soundtrack. Most importantly, there is no single bit of CGI to be found here. All the effects are 100% practical and were handled by Yoshinari Dohi, who has previously worked for Takashi Miike (The Great Yokai War), Yoshihiro Nishimura (Meatball Machine: Reject of Death) and Daisuke Yamanouchi (Bonded by Sorrow). Sasaki has already a couple other projects in the can with titles like
Dead Cook and
Devote to Spring and I'm eager to check them out. It'll be interesting to see how he handles longer narratives.
Apartment Inferno:
Sweet Home Inferno:
Just Like A Mother:
