Review: Re-Wind

[The following review contains MINOR SPOILERS; YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED!]

There’s something inherently unnerving about shot-on-video horror. For an entire generation—namely, my own—the near universal accessibility of VHS made it the medium of the average Joe; its visual language was that of everyday life: weddings, birthday parties, Christmas mornings, family reunions, school functions. Consequently, images of violence (even obviously simulated violence) captured by commercial camcorders appear more concrete, more immediate, more real; the dissonance between context and content evokes a tangible atmosphere of transgression, voyeurism, and violation.

From the opening frame of a severed hand clutching a tape to the fourth wall shattering climax, few films weaponize these subconscious connotations quite as effectively as Re-Wind (a.k.a. Celluloid Nightmares). Drawing clear inspiration from Michael Powell’s seminal Peeping Tom, director Hisayasu Sato crafts a stylish, giallo-flavored thriller (complete with kinetic cinematography, vibrant color palette, and propulsive musical score) that fully immerses the audience in the bloodshed. During the frequent handheld POV murder sequences, the lens becomes our eyes; we are accomplices to the killer’s sadistic crimes. How delightfully taboo!

A word of caution, since I was certainly caught off guard: as I’ve cheekily implied in the preceding text, this is a pinku eiga. For those unfamiliar with the term, this means that approximately every ten to fifteen minutes, the plot is interrupted by gratuitous (as in literally mandated by contractual obligation) soft core pornography. I’m no prude; I don’t object to explicit “adult” material on principle. I simply found this specific example to be disruptive, distracting, and profoundly unappealing—especially all the awkward oral fixations on display, along with the accompanying aural unpleasantness of grotesquely exaggerated slurping (judging by the quality of the ADR, the voice actors seem to have absolutely demolished a platter of watermelon in the recording booth).

Ultimately, however, this is a relatively minor blemish (indeed, I’m inclined to characterize it as a personal nitpick rather than an objective criticism). Evaluated as a whole, Re-Wind is a brilliantly crafted B-movie that—like many great works belonging to its genre—resides comfortably at the intersection of art and exploitation.