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Heart, Beating in the Dark (1982)
Yamiutsu Shinzo [HDARK] Japan, 1982, 75 min, BetaSP (NTSC) Directed By: Nagasaki Shunichi PROD/SCR: Nagasaki Shunichi CAM: Muto Kiichi CAST: Naito Takeshi, Muroi Shigeru, Suwa Taro |
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Little seen at the time (it was shot on Super-8 and couldn’t be subtitled), Nagasaki’s film has turned out to be a milestone in Japanese indie film history. It stars Muroi Shigeru and Naito Takashi as Inako and Ringo, a young, working-class couple on the run, holing up for the night in a borrowed room. Between episodes of food poisoning and rough sex their terrible secret is revealed in flashbacks in which, amazingly, they switch genders and roles. (There are also some weird interpolations from a real-life social worker.) What makes this outlaw classic so powerful is not the emotional and physical brutality, nor even the shocking revelation of the climax, but the fact that it is finally, irreducibly, a love story.
Preceded By: London Calling [HDARK] Japan, 1985, 13 min, Color Directed By: Nagasaki Shunichi A film director named Nagasaki Shunichi comes to the UK for the screening of his film Heart, Beating in the Dark at the London Film Festival. While in town, he tries to track down a former girlfriend with whom he has lost contact. His efforts seem fruitless, and he finds himself musing on notions of memory, place and loss... (TR) |
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