Nippon Horrors: Girl Divers of Spook Mansion [Ama no Bakemono Yashiki] (Morihei Magatani, 1959)

After hitting on the idea that making films about the female Ama divers of Japan’s remote coastal communities could prove a great way to get red-blooded males into cinemas, Shintoho studios must have found themselves wondering just what the hell kind of stories they could actually tell about these plucky maidens of the deep. So, in a sense, the idea of the splicing this nascent sub-genre with the series of interesting, low budget horror films the studio was also making at around the same time [also see: Ghost Cat Mansion, The Lady Vampire] must have been a bit of a no-brainer.

Which brings us to ‘Girl Divers of Spook Mansion’, the first in a brief flurry of ‘spooky Ama’ movies which also produced such unforgettable transliterated titles as ‘Ghost of the Girl Diver’ and my personal favourite, ‘Girl Diver Trembles in Fear’ (both 1960).

In real life of course, Ama divers were famed for setting out to sea in nothing more than loincloths, but in deference to standards of cinematic decency circa 1959, our divers here naturally all wear neat little halter-tops, big white bloomers and head-scarves. Pervs in the audience may be reassured though that, once they get down to sub-aquatic business, there's a whole lot of transparency goin’ on (all very tastefully done, mind).

(Those still protesting a lack of realism meanwhile may wish to reflect on the fact that, given the extreme physical duress of open sea diving and the level of expertise needed to carry it out effectively, the majority of real life Ama were liable to have been muscular, weather-beaten, mature women, in stark contrast to the happy-go-lucky gaggle of aspiring models and actresses seen strutting their stuff here; accuracy on this point however has never, so far as I’m aware, been demanded by these movies’ audiences.)

Whilst on the subject of the more exploitational aspects of these movies’ conception, Japanese genre film historians (hi, guys) may likewise wish to consider the scene early in ‘Girl Divers of Spook Mansion’ depicting a beach-side cat-fight between the leaders of two rival Ama factions, which plays out pretty much exactly like the equivalent stock scene from any given Toei ‘Pinky Violence’ movie a decade later. Indeed, lead diver Reiko Seto has a hard-boiled attitude and venomous stare that could have could have seen her managing quite nicely on the mean streets of early ‘70s Shinjuku.

Meanwhile, on the horror side of things, viewers expecting a lightweight, ‘Beach Party’ style affair are liable to be taken aback by the film’s unsettling credits sequence, which depicts members of the female cast frozen in various kinds of sinister/monstrous activity, mirroring the kind of tableaux traditionally seen in Japanese ‘ghost houses’ during the late summer Oban season.

Further to this, there is indeed some fairly strong kaidan-via-gothic type stuff to enjoy during the first half of the film, as the more central storyline sees a woman named Kyoko (future Toei star Yôko Mihara) arriving in the Ama village from Tokyo, after receiving a letter from her friend Waka (Kuniko Yamamura).

Waka appears to be living alone in a gigantic, Western-style mansion filled with an entire museum's-worth of dusty old statuary and antique knick-knacks from around the globe - seriously, the set-dressers just went crazy decking out this place - assisted, as as standard in such situations, by staff including a cackling hunchback and a sinister, stink-eye dispensing housekeeper who is often seen carrying a cat (rarely a good omen in these kind of things).

Waka claims she is being haunted by (I think) the ghost of her missing sister, who was last seen running toward the ocean after her husband was lost at sea, and indeed, some wonderfully spooky imagery and a few beautifully executed jump scares ensue. (Seriously, if jump scares were competitively-rated ala ice-skating, I’d hold up a “9” for these - just perfectly done.)

Disappointingly of course, it eventually becomes clear that the supernatural elements of this haunting are all phony, as Waka is actually being gas lighted by a gaggle of pleasingly maniacal villains who are looking to steal the family treasure, which it transpires is hidden in an underwater cave (and they would have gotten away with it too, if it weren't for those meddling pearl divers!)

Once the penny drops, there's still plenty to enjoy in the film’s more light-hearted, action/adventure-orientated second half however, including heavy Nikkatsu vibes as local youngsters groove to what sounds very much like Hawaiian music in the tiki-style beachside bar, and the wonderfully overplayed antics of the aforementioned villains (who include a corrupt, kimono-clad local politician and a lecherous, cigar-chomping fake marine scientist).

As is almost always the case with Japanese films of this era, the scope photography is splendid throughout, with the stuff in the shadowy, snake-haunted cave during the final act standing out as particularly atmospheric, even as it leads up to a great, LOL-worthy demise for the main villain. Perhaps best of all though, we get to enjoy the presence of a young Bunta Sugawara, making only his fifth credited screen appearance here as Mihara’s cop boyfriend. Spending much of his screen-time strutting around, Tarzan-style, in a pair of swimming trunks he appears to have stolen from a small child(!), Bunta makes for an engaging and off-beat presence here, as well as offering ‘a little something for the ladies’ in the midst of all the diving girls.

In closing, I should probably point out that I watched ‘Girl Divers of Spook Mansion’ without the benefit of subtitles, hoping that a rudimentary knowledge of basic Japanese vocab and a general familiarity with b-movie plotlines would see me through. As a result, I fear there were probably a number of story elements and sub-plots going on here which completely passed me by, and even the basics I've outlined above should be taken as a ‘best guess’. But nonetheless, I enjoyed the film a great deal.

Irrespective of the language barrier, the mixture of elegant, spook-house atmos, wistful seaside nostalgia, pulpy serial plotting and strangely wholesome titillation on offer here has much to recommend it, and viewers with a yen for the, uh, gentler side of Asian horror shouldn’t hesitate to dive in (sorry, couldn’t help myself) without delay.

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Poster image borrowed from the ever-wonderful Pulp International.

Deathblog: Bunta Sugawara (1933 – 2014)

Well, it’s been a bad month for yakuza movie actors, to put it mildly. Just a few weeks after the passing of Ken Takakura, the pre-eminent icon of the ‘60s ninkyo yakuza film, news came through on Monday of the death of the man who effectively took over as the figurehead of the genre when things turned nastier in the mad-dog, jitsuroku ‘70s - the one and only Bunta Sugawara.

Probably better known to Western movie fans than Takakura, I think it’s safe to say that anyone who has watched even the thinnest scattering of post-1970 Japanese crime films will be familiar with Bunta-san. Though he began acting in 1956, working at Shintoho and Shochiku before he signed up with Toei in the mid ’60s, Sugawara became pretty damn ubiquitous in the early 1970s, with his unmistakable visage and bullet-stopping forehead looming from what seems like thousands of movie posters, and his extraordinary string of collaborations with director Kinji Fukasaku standing out as arguably an all-time high watermark for Japanese crime cinema, incorporating such highlights as ‘Japanese Organised Crime Boss’ (1969), ‘Bloodstained Clan Honour’ (1970), ‘Street Mobster’ (1972), ‘Outlaw Killers: Three Mad-Dog Brothers’ (1972), and no less than eight films in the epochal ‘Battles Without Honour and Humanity’ series (1973 – 76).

Though Bunta-san often played noble, lone wolf heroes in the Takakura mold, he will be equally remembered for his personification of the kind of amoral, mad-dog maniacs that Fukasaku in particular liked to bring to the forefront in his films – a character type that Sugawara managed to realise with an astonishing level of adrenalin-ripped, kill-crazy intensity.

Despite his on-screen excesses however, Sugawara seems to have been regarded as a pretty chilled out guy, and indeed he undercut his ultra-macho image by simultaneously developing a talent for comedic acting, playing a happy-go-lucky straight man in Sadao Nakajima’s ‘Viper Brothers’ films, and no less than ten entries in Norifumi Suzuki’s phenomenally popular ‘Torakku Yaro’ (“Truck Rascals”) series (1975 – 1980). He also sent up his usual screen persona brilliantly in Kazuhiko Hasegawa’s oddball drama ‘The Man Who Stole The Sun’ (1979), playing a seemingly indestructible, Terminator-like police detective to hilarious effect.

He was also, coincidentally, the only Japanese person I’m aware of whose personal name begins with ‘B’, a fact that makes me peculiarly happy whatever I see his name.

I’m not sure quite what he got up to through the ‘80s, ‘90s and beyond, but he continued acting occasionally, popping up in a few Takashi Miike films and lending his voice to a few Studio Ghibli productions. A brief English language obit from Japanese news site Mainichi states that “Later in life Sugawara turned to farming in central Japan's Yamanashi Prefecture, and headed a social justice group”. So that sounds nice. Good for him.

Sayonara Bunta-san, and domo arigato for all the times you acted so hard I felt like I’d actually been punched in the face.

Below is a quickly assembled gallery featuring merely a few of the many awesome posters which featured Bunta’s likeness.