Event

THE EMBRYO HUNTS IN SECRET

Dir. Wakamatsu Kji, 1966
Japan. 72 min.
In Japanese with English subtitles.

Part art house and part Grindhouse, this classic Pink was made after Wakamatsu left Nikkatsu to create his own production company, Wakamatsu Productions, or Wakamatsu Pro. It was also one of the first Pink Films written by Adachi Masao, who would one day become radical leftist filmmaker in his own right, escaping Japan to fight for the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO). The director-writer duo of Wakamatsu and Adachi would create some of the most gory and grotesque films in the Pink Film repertoire, with Embryo Hunts in Secret one of their most renowned collaborations. The film is a brutal exploration of the postwar Japanese psyche through a childlike megalomaniac who keeps a woman imprisoned in his small apartment, controlling her every move and torturing her between bouts of denial and humiliation. The result is a grim look at the state of postwar consciousness, where redemption never feels quite as cathartic as it should.