Go, Go, Second Time Virgin [1969]

Puritans scoff at Go, Go Second Time Virgin for being sadistic, exploitative and trashy, while the fans of this cult film drool over it and qualify it as wacky, daring and haunting; either way, both sides would surely agree that this was one crazy film. Shot in only 4 days and made on an ultra-budget by Pinku Eiga icon Kōji Wakamatsu, this was an odd, angry, rebellious, hallucinogenic and nihilistic exploration of youth delinquency, angst, alienation and repression, as also collapse of social order and moral conventions, emphasized by its extreme content and graphic visuals. Hence, though not a political film per se in terms of its content, it certainly was one if the director’s intent is to be taken into consideration. Set almost completely on the roof of an apartment building, it starts off with a young girl (Mimi Kozakura) being forcibly violated by a gang of punks, silently observed by a seemingly meek and docile young John Lennon-lookalike (Michio Akiyama). The two lonely, suicidal and self-destructive outsiders, over the course of the next day, forge a strange bond. She hates her life and he hates the world; she begs him to kill her, while he, in a shocking turn of events, goes on a killing spree. Hyper-violent, unabashedly lurid, self-consciously avant-garde, and with shoddy production values and deliberate surrealistic splashes, as in the sudden moments in colour in an other-wise B/W film, this sure isn’t a film that can be recommended outside a select circle. Interestingly, despite its overt thematic concerns, its melancholic underpinnings were decidedly palpable, more so thanks to the excellent soundtrack.

Director: Koji Wakamatsu
Genre: Drama/Existential Drama/Avant-Garde/Experimental Film
Language: Japanese
Country: Japan