Sadistic and Masochistic (サディスティック＆マゾヒスティック)

I worked with you on a total of three films back then.

MASARU KONUMA - FILM DIRECTOR I noticed that during preproduction,

you were very mild,

very inoffensive.

I wasn't aware of that.

But I've noticed that for myself,

sometimes when I'm on the set, I become sadistic.

I start getting aggressive or being offensive.

What about you?

I don't do it on purpose.

The night before filming, I do a "shoot" in my head.

It's amazing. Everybody does exactly as I want them to.

The reality is quite different.

It tends to disappoint me.

Does that ever emerge in your everyday life?

Do you ever become aggressive?

Never.

I've never picked a fight.

Maybe I would if someone started shouting abuse at me,

or if told to "grin and bear it."

Not me. I don't. No way.

I find myself getting masochistic on a shoot.

I'd have to say sometimes I get that too.

A touch of masochism in my personality.

SADISTIC & MASOCHISTIC

Fifteen years ago, in midsummer, we shot Woman in the Box right here.

It was the hottest spell of the entire summer.

Just here, at the east exit of Shinjuku Station.

Record temperatures that day. It got to 41 degrees centigrade.

Scorching hot.

The film had hardly any budget at all, so I did something we're not supposed to do.

HIDEO NAKATA - ASSISTANT DIRECTOR I dashed off to a pub

for ice water.

The cast and crew were on the verge of heatstroke.

We parked the van just here.

Inside, they were filming the sadistic sex scene.

The scene required the vehicle to be parked here.

We put barriers all along here

to stop the passersby from actually seeing inside.

The reason why we put curtains up

was to conceal the sex scene,

and also we wanted to shoot the passersby

with the station as a backdrop.

What was the director like?

On set, he was quite demanding.

He wanted aggressive acting.

I suppose you could say he was sadistic.

That was my only impression of him.

He considers love scenes to be important to the story.

While we were shooting, he came across as being irritated.

No!

They can see everything.

SAEKO KIZUKI - ACTRESS It was 41 degrees-

no air conditioning.

It was hot.

But I've always loved the sauna,

so I didn't actually mind the heat.

I thought of it like a sauna.

Hello there.

Good to see you again.

Filming already?

Where were you born?

Up in Otaru, Hokkaido.

What's your family history?

My family?

I lived with my mother and father.

Then, as you know, WWII started in 1941.

My father taught school before the war.

Then he got drafted into the army.

Within a year, he was repatriated and died of TB.

I have no memories of him.

There was a festival when I was six or seven.

The most erotic thing back then was the film of a birth.

- A baby being born? - Yeah.

They had this barker out front.

"Roll up and see everything!"

Then he'd give us a tiny glimpse of what to expect.

It made us all the more eager to watch the film.

We couldn't afford tickets.

So all of us kids were hanging around outside.

We were so eager, but could only catch the occasional glimpse.

In all, there were three films on giving birth,

but you could hardly make out what was on screen.

Maybe the producers did it on purpose,

but it looked like it was raining on the screen.

Those prints would have been ancient by then.

They'd been dragged around the carnival circuit for years.

In his teens, Konuma's mother remarried.

She told him to leave home.

She sent me off to Tokyo when I was 15.

In those days, there was no TV.

I had no idea about Tokyo.

It was as distant to me as Africa or Alaska is to kids today.

I didn't want to go. I cried.

In Tokyo, I soon got homesick, so I started going to the movies.

It was a way to forget the loneliness.

The locations were the pits!

I sent a crew out carrying a big crowbar-

walking down the streets swinging that bar.

When we came across a manhole, we opened it.

Then in Takadanobaba or Shibuya, I think,

we found an outlet on the side of a storm drain.

I sent the crew in there to check it out.

They looked so miserable, all hunched over.

It smelled really bad.

That stink was just so depressing.

I remember one funny incident there.

We all arrived on location just after midnight.

Ejima was standing on the road with a big crowbar.

He pried open a manhole and said, "Here it is."

Everyone did a double take. Then they climbed down there.

There seemed to be no place to rig up the lights.

I had my doubts.

We needed two sewers converging, and that was the best he could find.

You reckoned that, for a drain, the water was very clean.

So you built a dam down there.

Help!

No one will help you.

The monster is coming to eat you.

There's no escape.

Can you cross the water, Michiyo?

Raw sewage from all over the city.

Dip your foot in it.

Listen to me.

It is fouled with piss, shit and blood.

Animal blood and waste. Menstrual blood.

That's the first I've heard that they built a dam.

Weird dialogue!

Help! I beg you.

I'll do whatever you say.

Please.

Please help me.

You really sounded like you'd had enough.

I didn't have to act!

There were swarms of wriggling maggots down there.

- You didn't know? - No, I-

You were there only briefly.

The director kept only the crew he needed.

Right. You all left.

It wasn't so bad when the entire crew was down there.

Then everyone left, and the camera started rolling.

I was psyching myself up for the scene, getting into character.

Then I noticed on the wall of the tunnel-

At first, it didn't register.

Then I noticed the moving mass was maggots.

I swear.

I realized I'd leaned up against them, touched them!

I was terrified.

It shows in the shot.

The thing about shooting on location-

compared to everyday life, it's another world.

I really like that "reality gap."

The whole atmosphere on a shoot is like a carnival.

On any shoot, everyone becomes fanatical.

But Konuma's crew gets even more intense.

They have to, to keep up with his energy levels.

The ocean?

What will you do next?

I remember that scene. I was drowsy.

That was my big chance. I fell asleep inside the box.

It was so relaxing, just the right temperature.

When the box was opened, I had to say my line.

I was thinking that while I was sleeping.

HIROSHI HANZAWA - PRODUCER I might be the only one

who thought so at the time,

but Konuma's crew were all over the place.

Then the female lead, that actress Saeko Kizuki-

her natural character seemed to bring the production into harmony.

In high school, Konuma watched movies.

He studied in the art department of Nihon University.

In 1961, he joined Nikkatsu as an assistant director.

In the same year,

producer Yuki and director Tanaka all joined Nikkatsu around the same time.

OHARA TANAKA KONUMA YUKI Diligent Yuki, slovenly Ohara,

OHARA TANAKA KONUMA YUKI faithful Tanaka, reckless Konuma.

A perfect description.

I didn't deliberately strike that pose.

Once I yelled and threw a book at Hasebe.

When Konuma was an assistant director, he rarely did a lick of work.

MASARU MORI - CINEMATOGRAPHER He was always off gambling

or playing games.

- The movies still got made. - They got made.

So there were four ADs there?

We only needed the chief and one assistant.

We didn't notice the other two were missing.

Tanaka was an artist. It was his plan originally.

We saved up from our Nikkatsu salaries.

We wanted to make a movie outside the studio.

KOYU OHARA - DIRECTOR We put Konuma in charge of the money,

and he spent it!

He went and blew it all at girlie bars.

He blew a month's salary in one night.

He was buying drinks for all the girls.

All the money we'd saved to make our film,

he went and spent every last penny.

Tanaka was absolutely furious.

Anyone would be.

Then what happened?

They reckoned it was their fault for having trusted him.

That was it. We started all over again.