Just in time for spooky season, Radiance brings us their second volume of classic Japanese supernatural films from the vaults of defunct studio Daiei. If the prior volume is any indication, this 4000-copy limited edition is likely to sell out before next Halloween, so interested fans are advised not to wait. As an added benefit, all of the films are based on ancient Japanese folk tales, so viewers will get some education along with the frights.
Buy Daiei Gothic Vol. 2: Japanese Ghost Stories Blu-rayDemon of Mount Oe has some surprisingly fun and inventive special effects and garish colors during action scenes. The best effect is a massive kaiju-sized spider that terrorizes the humans in the final act, followed quickly by a big mountainside battle where soldiers roll huge burning boulders of debris down on opposing forces. There’s even a funny moment where a demon in silhouette apes the original Nosferatu pouncing hands pose, a truly unexpected homage. Sadly, aside from the bravura effects scenes, the film is a fairly standard samurai period drama with uninspired staging and conventional acting. The basic plot revolves around a team of samurai who are dispatched to purge Mount Oe of a shape-shifting demon in order to stop his army’s assault on their territory. The disconnect between the bulk of the drab drama film and the fun stuff is pronounced, but the effects make it all worthwhile.
If you only have time for one of the films, The Haunted Castle is the clear standout in the set. While it starts off slow and also seems to be falling into Mount Oe’s period drama trap, once the supernatural shenanigans kick into gear they never let up. When a heated game of Go turns deadly, the murdered man’s sister performs a blood ritual to empower his black cat to take vengeance on the offending clan. Yes, a simple board game triggers a massacre. The film belongs to a distinctly Japanese subgenre of horror films involving ghost cats, with the cat in this instance transferring its spirit into the body of a young woman to carry out its objectives with access to opposable thumbs. It’s too dimly lit for much of the film, but the spectacle of retribution from beyond the grave is chillingly effective, aided by an eerie score.
Ghost of Hasane Swamp, aka Blind Masseur, follows a, well, blind masseur who moonlights as a moneylender. When he tries to collect on a debt from a wealthy retainer to the shogun, currently otherwise occupied cheating on his wife with his mistress, the cheater directs the masseur to visit his wife for payment. Since she has no funds, the wife assumes her husband expects her to compensate the masseur in other ways, leading the cheating husband to fly into a rage when he returns home to their tryst, murdering both of them. There’s not much actual ghoulish retribution, with the spirits of the victims generally more background threats than direct combatants. That leaves normal human squabbles to progress the plot, mostly surrounding the son of the murderer who gets assigned culpability for the sins of his father before adding a few of his own. It’s a good story, just lacking in consistent ghost action.
All three films were scanned in 4K in Japan before being restored by Radiance. The transfers are mostly clean, but light debris is still evident in all films, most notably the last. Color grading was performed, really making the lurid lighting pop in The Haunted Castle, but all of the films are overly dark and dimly lit so could have benefited from some brightness adjustment without sacrificing any scares. All films are presented in their original aspect ratios and original uncompressed mono sound. The PCM audio is consistently crisp and clear with no glaring flaws.
Multiple new and exclusive bonus features are included with each film, including interviews with filmmakers, visual essays, and audio commentary for over 20 minutes of select scenes from Ghost of Kasane Swamp. The features are so in-depth that there’s even a story about the tragic life of Haunted Castle’s cat lady, who made her final film appearance here before going to jail for a crime of passion. More exclusive essays are included in a thick booklet, along with cast and crew credits and information on the restorations. It’s a deluxe, full-featured box of macabre delights well worth adding to the collections of any Asian cinema aficionados.
