Osou!

 

 
Yasuharu Hasebe is an "unsung hero" of the pinku eiga genre. With films like Rape! 13th Hour, Assault! Jack the Ripper, or the unpretentiously titled Rape!, Hasebe has carved a niche in which to rest surrounded by the most subversive sleaze to be found, all his own creation. Though not sleaze in the general sense of the term, most of Hasebe's films juggle what which most people refer to as "misogynistic" tendencies Osou!, for example, is the tale of Kumiko, a policewoman who is brutally raped by a strange attacker after an automobile collision. Not stopping with one count of sexual assault, the stranger returns time and time again to penetrate her at her most vulnerable moments, eventually reaching the point in which she wholeheartedly looks forward to their next rendezvous. It's not about the how, it's about the why. Osou! takes a woman and places her in such a situation. Libidinous to a fault, her own desires mesh with the savagery exhibited by her non-consensual lover producing a whole new woman. Ideally, you'd imagine that with the right treatment, a woman could adapt to a similar sexual situation, if not for consent than surely for instinct. Kumiko pines for violation by Osou!'s halfway mark. She is mesmerized by force and blunt seduction, which is not an uncommon fantasy for most women. It starts off simple with compliance towards biting, minor rough play, and the ever-effective hands-around-throat. Once the seed of obscure practice blossoms, a warmer reception may be held towards more extreme activities. This isn't misogyny in the slightest, it's evolution.

 

Before the audacious assault of a policewoman in a police station, Hasebe makes sure to pamper his actress with backdrops of thick concrete jungles for her to explore and enough motive to warrant the aggravated attacks committed against her. In a word, Kumiko is kind of a bitch. Had you ever had a run in with a police officer, I'm sure you've whined and complained about the balance of fair and unfair. Perhaps you were traveling 50 mph in a 40 mph zone - Mr. Important has got an important date to keep. Kumiko flips through her previous tickets to interrogate possible suspects and on her quest, apologizes to many people she may have wronged or been unfair to. A parking ticket certainly isn't grounds for bodily repossession, correct?  For Hasebe, uniform is key to the eroticism within Osou!. Most males, hell, women too for that matter, admit to being aroused by uniform and costume in the bedroom. For this reason alone, Osou! inhabits the very core of eroticism in rape and not some far off filmic plane of exploitative trash and senseless buggery. The rapist assuredly is committing an illegal and unanimously frowned upon act but Kumiko takes it without principle, without morality. She sheds away the layers of incorrectness to find the heart of the act; pleasure. One might spite my words and cry offense to them but I'll have you know my words are no more offensive than the film they are in response to.

Sex follows Kumiko everywhere. Osou! is essentially an odyssey of sexual appetite. You'd swear angelic Kumiko hadn't an idea of the act with her tight and proper appearance. Once she is raped though, things swiftly change. Confronting possible suspects, she is seated inside of a car, conversing with a man she had ticketed previously as he has sex in close proximity. Following this incident, Kumiko decides to spend the night at her sister's house but is awoken by her sister's husband, as he ravages her body with his tongue. Aghast, the sister thrusts Kumiko out onto the streets with tears brimming in her eyes. This is a documentation of a woman uncovering the beastly side of Japan, no, men, as she is manhandled at every turn and thrown into dizzying sexuality. Definitely a strong film of Hasebe's, Osou! manages to help us discover what it means to hold onto that which fractures us. Once Kumiko begins masturbating, she comes to terms with her impure bits & bliss. Aiding the frenzied attacks is an array of strongly composed classical pieces that flutter closely over the head of the mysterious black-gloved rapist. One would expect to be averse to the rape, as it is an act of territorial noncompliance. However, Kumiko has the self-defense skills of a muzzled orangutan which leaves sympathy nowhere to be found. That's not to pull a card of natural selection, simply, it's too damn silly, her falling into the traps of a secret admirer almost repetitiously. Yasuharu Hasebe reigns king over this land of forced sexual encounters and there seems to be hardly anyone who can hold a torch to his objectifying of women. Osou! is a classic of his standard.

-mAQ