70's Asian Horror Part Seven

GHOST OF GUTS EATER

(1973)
Dir - Sanit Kosaroth
Overall: WOOF

A rare, early 1970s horror film from Thailand that managed to escape its native country, the hilariously titled Ghost of Guts Eater, (Krasue Sao), is more of a novelty than anything else.  One of the earliest movies to feature a krasue demon of Southeast Asian folklore which manifests itself as a vampiric, flying woman's head with its vital organs hanging from it, sadly this creature is only given a few brief scenes even though there are more than one such monster present.  It is a tortuously slow watch for a number of other reasons though. At a hundred and five minutes in length and with an episodic structure, characters with either no personality or an obnoxious one deal with the fact that one of them is possessed by the krausue spirit of her dead grandmother, but this hardly has an exciting pay off at any instance.  Sometimes they profess their love for each other, sometimes they bust into spontaneous fist fights, sometimes they die, and it is all spread out so long over inconsequential whining and babbling that one is likely to lose their place in the convoluted plot line before even the halfway point.   It is sad that an export with some historical significance would be so unwatchably dull, but here we are.

 

INUGAMI NO TATARI

(1977)

Dir - Shun'ya Itô

Overall: MEH

Director Shun'ya Itô's first film outside of the Female Prisoner series was Inugami No Tatari, (Curse of the Dog God); a contemporary, supernatural, curse/revenge story with environmental elements plus others right out of The Exorcist.  At an hour and forty-three minutes, the movie is brimful of genre motifs and ideas; something that is actually part of the problem.  There is simply too much packed into the proceedings which leaves the plot no other alternative then to regularly stagnate so that it has time to introduce another bloated chain of events that give it all an exhausting feel.  Some of the ideas even seem rushed or shoehorned in there like a woman possessed, a family getting terrorized by superstitious locals, a uranium company mining on their land, a husband struck with grief between the two opposing forces, and then more possession, screaming, fires, vengeful spirits attacking, and darkly magical forces unleashed.  Tone wise, it has the usual bouts of Japanese melodrama that comes off as unintentionally silly and creepy at the exact same time, such as an over the top exorcism ceremony conducted by shamans and a climax that sees another possessed lady jumping all over the place and causing havoc.  It becomes a lot to keep track of and despite some atmospheric moments and Itô's general commitment to keeping it more on the serious end of the spectrum instead of collapsing into mere quirky camp, it could probably just use a significant edit to truly deliver.

RETURN OF THE DEAD

(1979)

Dir - Han Hsiang Li

Overall: MEH

Following up The Ghost Story from the same year, director Han Hsiang Li's Return of the Dead, (Xiao hun yu), is more of a tradition anthology horror film, set up in an insane asylum where three random inmates tell the tale of how then ended up there.  The first segment is a by-numbers adaptation of the age old "Monkey's Paw" story, (which was also utilized in Amnicus' Tales from the Crypt seven years prior), the second concerns a naked ghost who lures a former love interest back into her clutches for revenge purposes, and the last features a recently deceased, beautiful, and wealthy actor who befriends a friendly rickshaw worker, only to trick him into winning counterfeit silver coins.  The film runs over ninety-minutes and unfortunately feels far longer, with each segment well-deserving of a trim to tighten up the cumbersome pacing.  A big part of the issue is that the entire presentation lacks any violence or hilariously strange set pieces, but it also fails to generate much spooky atmosphere with only some minor chills delivered within the last minute of each story.  By comparison, the nudity is more prevalent than any over-the-top or even subtle horror movie window dressing, but this is still a far less horny affair than others that were produced by the Shaw Brothers in the following decade.