REVIEW - Porno jidaigeki: Bohachi bushido (Teruo Ishii, 1973)

Porno jidaigeki: Bohachi Bushido, also known as Bohachi - Clan of the Forgotten Eight, is an exploitation picture by the masterful genre director, Teruo Ishii. Standing out, even in Ishii's filmography, as a gruesome and sleazy film, Porno jidaigeki: Bohachi Bushido is a descent into a dark and seedy world of amoral behaviour and vice.

The protagonist, Shiro (Tetsuro Tamba), begins the film with the phrase "To die is hell, but to live is also hell." This is a particularly bleak opening statement and one that prepares you for the amoral behaviour of almost all the characters in the film and the nihilism of the lead. The phrase is said against the background of the opening credits, which see Shiro fighting off attackers with their blood sprays forming the credits and the blood curdling sounds of gruesome deaths. The opening is striking with a simplistic colour palette and a minimal backdrop. The whole way through the film this style is mirrored where the obvious budgetary constraints are not a hindrance to Teruo Ishii, who instead makes use of what he has and mirrors the bleak narrative with the sparse minimalism of the setting and the cinematography. Ishii also uses low angle shots and spotlights throughout which add to the feeling that you are in a dream, trapped in a hellish nightmare.

Shiro is fleeing from the law and after a fight on a bridge decides to take his life and jumps into the river below. He then wakes to find himself being warmed back to life by naked women. Shiro has been taken in by the Bohachi clan, a ruthless group who collect women and psychologically break them down through violence, rape and humiliation. They are the most abhorrent group of men, not even human, known as "beasts in animal skin". With little choice Shiro joins the Bohachi clan but fails a test they impose on him of forcibly deflowering a girl that he believes to be an innocent villager.

Shiro flees the clan but is attacked by the police and wielding two swords dispatches hundreds of men resulting in geysers of blood and decapitated limbs. The boss of the Bohachi clan returns and offers to take Shiro back in and offers to use his influence to keep the police from pursuing Shiro. He agrees to stay and is sent by the boss to crush all rival prostitution organisations and the feudal lords and samurai that run them. Shiro goes on a murderous rampage slaughtering more and more people. Helping Shiro and the Bohachi clan are the clans trained female fighters who are so brainwashed that they will even throw themselves on a fire just to save a Bohachi clan member.

Ultimately the leader of the Bohachi decides to kill Shiro and tries to do so by giving him opium and unlimited sex in order to 'destroy him'. What follows is a visually stunning scene of Shiro hallucinating with Teruo Ishii's superb direction giving the scene the necessary nightmare visuals. Shiro gets wise to the leader's plan and escapes from the trap. He fights off five female naked bodyguards in a particularly lurid and unforgettable scene and punishes the boss by locking him in a cage with the rejected syphilitic Bohachi prostitutes.

Shiro, still confused and weak from the opium, is again confronted by the officials hunting him down and a violent fight ensues with decapitated limbs and heads literally flying through the air. The scene is filmed on a minimal, mostly black set with snow falling all around. Non-diegetic lighting, including coloured spotlights, and glimpses of hallucinated images, coupled with the shocking violence make this scene a thrilling climax to the film. The police eventually back away and Shiro is left alone, once again a stray dog, surrounded by black.

Based on already violent manga by Kazuo Koike, the writer of the Lone Wolf & Cub series and Lady Snowblood, in the hands of Teruo Ishii Porno jidaigeki: Bohachi Bushido is an extreme film with violence and sex pushed to the limits of taste but done with an incredible eye and genuine originality. Again Teruo Ishii proves his worth as one of the most stunning genre directors working in Japan in the 70s and also one who will pull no punches with the content in his films.