GUTS OF A BEAUTY

GUTS OF A BEAUTY (AKA ENTRAILS OF A BEAUTIFUL WOMAN, AKA BIJO NO HARAWATA) is the first part of Kazuo 'Gaira' Komizu's infamous "splatter-eros" trilogy, and was Gaira's official directorial debut. It was made in 1986. The two further installments (the films bear no relation to each other in terms of story or characters) in the trilogy are FEMALE INQUISITOR (AKA GUTS OF A VIRGIN III: RUSTED BODY, AKA GOMON KIFUJIN, 1987) and ENTRAILS OF A VIRGIN (AKA GUTS OF A VIRGIN, AKA SHOJO NO HARAWATA, 1988, also available on DVD). Gaira was also responsible for THE LIVING DEAD IN TOKYO BAY (AKA BATTLE GIRL, AKA BATORU GARU, 1992), THE MAN WHO INHERITED A STAR (AKA HOSHI O TSUGUMONO, 1990, Starring 'Beat' Takeshi Kitano) and XX:BEAUTIFUL WEAPON (1993). He was also the cameraman on Shigeru Izumiya's early splatterpunk/underground film DEATH POWDER (AKA DESU PAWUDA, 1986).

We are first introduced to a small-time Yakuza boss, who permanently wears dodgy big shades. He is eating a meal and we are shown his mouth in close up. Cut to a warehouse. A woman is on the ground, surrounded by three thugs. "Please let me go" she says. The boss enters, and the men tear the girl's clothes off and one of the men (who has a huge tattoo on his back) start to rape her. The girl (Yoshimi) is injected with 'Angel Rain' - a drug which apparently makes women sex-crazed. She rolls about in ecstasy and the other two thugs have sex with her. The boss leaves. Cut to the 'Aquarium Clinic', and Yoshimi running up the stairs, clothes torn. She is found by a female doctor working there. She tells her about what has happened. It turns out that Yoshimi's sister was the girlfriend of one of the Yakuza, Higashi, and he got her addicted to the drug. He then sold her to people in Africa, via the Phillipines. Yoshimi had tracked down Higashi but had been caught. We see Yoshimi's veins in close-up. Dark liquid throbs in them. She runs out of the room onto the roof of the clinic and jumps to her death.
Next we see the boss with his girlfriend, who is also addicted to the drug, and is hence sex-obsessed. She gives him a blow job (heavy optical censoring), but the phone rings, telling him that the girl escaped. The doctor (who it turns out is a psychiatrist), calling herself Yoshimi, meets Higashi in a bar and takes him back to her clinic (after first slipping a tablet into his drink). There they attempt to make love, but Higashi can't come. Yoshimi hypnotises him, telling him that the next time his gang calls him an idiot he must stab them. She then tells him he will come, which he does. He wakes up. Cut to the gang in their office. "Idiot!" He pulls out a knife and makes a pathetic attempt at stabbing them. He is shot and tortured till he tells them what has happened. He is then forced to ring Yoshimi to arrange to meet her again that night, saying he has killed them. Cut to Higashi hanging chained by his ankles and wrists. The boss shoots him a few times, then two of the thugs (dressed in plastic overcoats) stab him frantically, cutting bits off, and leaving a horrible bloody mess. The boss meets Yoshimi in the bar ("How can you live with yourself - with all this evil?" she asks him. "How can we live without it?" he replies) and they take her back to the warehouse to see what's left of Higashi. They then rape her (a very graphic and unpleasant scene) and inject her with the Angel Rain, but she dies. The boss sends one of the thugs to dispose of her body and Higashi's. He stops for a piss and Yoshimi comes back to life, but as a huge bloody zombie. She snaps him in two. Cut to another of the thugs. She pulls half his head off, leaving the lower half shooting blood out and bits of brain falling out. She then meets the tattooed man, who she takes back to the clinic and has sex with. During sex, she strangles him, then has sex with his corpse. Cut to the boss's girlfriend, masturbating. Knock at the door. She looks through a spyhole, and sees a tattooed back, opens the door. The monster is standing there, holding up the skin of the man with the tattoo. The monster enters the house and we see its penis, a big bloody thing, with a mouth (like the second mouth that the alien has in ALIENS). She sucks it, and then has sex with it. The penis eats its way out of her body, killing her. Finally, the boss comes home. The monster retracts its penis and we see that it also has a vagina (in other words, it's a hermaphrodite). It sits on the boss' head, suffocating him, and leaving a thick goo all over his head.
The final scene is of the psychiatrist back in her clinic. Her colleague bids her goodnight and leaves. She pulls out several bags of Angel Rain, pouring their contents on the table and eating some. She then writhes about on the floor, her mouth and breasts seemingly buffeted by an unseen force, and her veins pulsating. She turns back into the monster and goes to leave... The end.

Gaira certainly decided to make his first film as director go with a bang!!! It's probably the most unpleasant film of the trilogy, and it's certainly the most difficult to watch. Quite why the rapes have to be so graphic is not immediately clear. It is very worrying to imagine someone actually enjoying watching this type of material, and it's most definitely presented as entertainment (and in an erotic style). A similar criticism as is often made of I SPIT ON YOUR GRAVE could be levelled at this film - namely, that the rape part of the film takes up about 3/4 of the run time, and the revenge part only the last 1/4. The plot is also fairly unbelievable, with the doctor's reasons for getting so involved with what is obviously a very dangerous gang never being made clear. Plot isn't one of Gaira's strong points as a director, and he should probably stick to making the sort of illogical, plotless horror films that he's good at (GUTS OF A VIRGIN, for example). The supernatural element is never really given any explanation either, nor is what use the Angel Dust would be to Yakuza gangs. The Angel Dust part of the story is quite interesting, given that the same year Gaira worked on Izumiya's very strange DEATH POWDER, another film involving a strange drug (and another virtually plotless film, though very strong on visuals). This film is not likely to change the opinion of anyone who thinks that the Japanese are a slightly sick race, and is certain to offend anyone who doesn't derive pleasure from watching women get raped. However, the scenes at the end with the monster are quite inspired, as are some of the death scenes (though the killing of Higashi by the Yakuza themselves is the most difficult murder scene to watch). The idea of the monster being a hermaphrodite is also very unusual. The monster's sharp-toothed penis also has to be seen to be believed! Without any doubt, this is an influential film, if only on Japanese directors, and is historically very interesting, being one of the very first real out-and-out gore/rape films, which have now become commonplace in the Japanese cinema. If you've never seen any of these films, then this is probably as good a place to start as any, but as I said earlier - don't buy if you're easily upset... If you're thinking of buying either this or VIRGIN, go for the latter film - it's a more satisfying piece of cinema, and has much more artistic merit.

It's interesting to note the mistakes JSV have made on the covers of their two Gaira releases also. Firstly, they insist on crediting the director of both films as one 'Toshio Sato', when (just about) everyone is well aware that Kazuo Komizu was responsible for them. A person called Toshio Sato does exist, he was a minor actor in Ridley Scott's BLACK RAIN and in CADILLAC MAN. However, he most certainly did not direct these films! Secondly, they've mixed up the plot summaries on the back covers of the two DVD's. So, rather confusingly, the summary on the back of GUTS OF A VIRGIN is that of GUTS OF A BEAUTY and vice versa. The last thing that the world of Japanese underground/horror films needs is more misinformation and it would be nice if small companies like JSV could make a bit more effort with their packaging, but I guess it's not too big a thing (let's face it - Anchor Bay couldn't even spell Profondo right on the inlay card for DEEP RED!). Also, it's nice to see that the JSV DVD's come with a couple of inlays - one is a sheet showing 4 posters (which you can order), and the other is a little booklet of JSV's releases. Better than nothing, I think.
Another point in JSV's favour is that the subtitles actually make sense - no spelling mistakes (or very few), and no major grammatical errors, which makes a nice change. Having said that, I find it particularly annoying when the credits for films aren't subtitled. Neither of these releases has any subtitles on the credits, so it's impossible to find out many details about the film's cast and crew. This would have been nice to have, as details concerning editors, producers etc. are very difficult to come by for Japanese films.

DVD Specification
Original year of release - 1986
Approximate running time - 68min.
Aspect ratio - Widescreen (1.85:1)
System - NTSC (colour)
Rating - 16 (!!!)
Sound - Stereo
DVD release - Japan Shock Video
Region Coding - Region 0 (code free)

DVD Extras
Japan Shock Video Trailers for the following films; EVIL DEAD TRAP, EVIL DEAD TRAP II - HIDEKI, GUTS OF A VIRGIN, GUTS OF A BEAUTY, WET ROPE and BEAUTIFUL GIRL HUNTER.
German subtitles

DVD Ratings (out of 5)
Picture - 3
The first thing that I should mention here is that the JSV introduction on the DVD I am reviewing has some real problems with jumping - the picture jumps up and down and blocks of pixels seem to stick. Also, one of the times that I put the disc in, the image locked up altogether. I've never experieneced this with any other disc in my player, but obviously I can't say whether all of the BEAUTY DVD's suffer from this problem. It does suggest cheap mastering though, and is a little worrying.
The picture on this disc initially looked better than on the VIRGIN disc, slightly clearer and deeper colours. However, after watching the film right through, the overall impression I got was that the image was somewhat less impressive than on the VIRGIN disc. There was some shimmering around the outlines in certain scenes, a little more grain and the picture just generally didn't look as good as the VIRGIN disc. Still, not too bad thoughl...
Sound - 3
The film is presented in 2-track stereo, like GUTS OF AVIRGIN, but the sound is not as impressive on this DVD. Still, it's adequate and does the job. There's very little music in this film, and no real bass, so I guess the sound is not too important. This isn't the case on the VIRGIN DVD which makes effective use of the ominous music, and bassy rumblings. Better than just a mono track, though (which is what you'd expect to get on a DVD like this), and free from static or hiss.
Extras - 2
A set of trailers for JSV's own DVD releases (presumably WET ROPE is next on their list. This is a nunsploitation film, Japan-style!) The trailers aren't particularly good - it would have been much nicer to have the original Japanese trailers (though some of these might be the original trailers - it's hard to tell). The quality varies - the WET ROPE and BEAUTIFUL GIRL HUNTER trailers are particularly good quality, looking crystal clear. All-in-all, not very impressive. They could at least have included some biographical detail on Gaira, who is a fascinating charcter by all accounts...
Overall Rating - 3
Overall, a less satisfying disc than the VIRGIN one, though still very worthy of inclusion in any Japanese horror fan's collection. Certainly an improvement on the many bootlegs around, but sadly still fogged (and heavily digitised in one section). Lack of decent extras doesn't help, but stereo sound is nice to have. Also, possible problems with the mastering of the disc, and the lack of effort put into the cover don't reflect well on JSV. The problem with all these Holland/Germany releases (JSV, EC, Laser Paradise etc.) is that although they are small companies putting out genre product that is much appreciated by those of us living in draconian states, the prices that are charged for their discs is very high in comparison to US discs (though this is understandable), making it annoying when (admittedly quite minor) details like the covers are not produced properly. As I said above, if you're making a choice between the 2 releases, go for VIRGIN... Still, respect must be payed to JSV for making these films available on DVD at all (my fingers are firmly crossed for a DVD release of NAKED BLOOD)...

AKA
ENTRAILS OF A BEAUTIFUL WOMAN (Direct translation)
BIJO NO HARAWATA (Original Japanese title)
GUTS OF A VIRGIN II

Alternative versions
Very few. There was a Japanese video release (label unknown), which was widescreen and optically censored.
There was also a previous Japan Shock Video VHS release, which was essentially the same print as this DVD.
The film has never been (and will never be) submitted to the BBFC. There is no way that this film would ever be granted a certificate, even cut by about 30 mins!