Inflatable Sex Doll Of The Wastelands — Inflatable Sex Doll Of The Wastelands( Blu Ray)
The wonderful, named Inflatable Sex Doll Of The Wastelands, is a Japanese Pink film from the late 60’s. It’s a decidedly wonky and often disorienting blend of noir, surrealism, and, of course, female flesh. Here from Deaf Crocodile is a Blu-ray release of the film, featuring a restored print, a new commentary track, and a few other new extras.
Inflatable Sex Doll of the Wastelands ( Kôya No Dacchi Waifu) is from the year 1967. It was helmed by Mikasa, Hokkaido, Japan Atsushi Yamatoya- who wrote and directed the picture. Between the mid-60s and early 70s, he had five feature credits to his name- either within the pink/ Roman porno, or crime action films- such as Season of Treason (1966) regarding a troubled photographer returning to Japan, and crime action/ Roman porno crossover Trap of Lust (1973).
The film focuses on Shô ( Yûichi Minato), a thinly bearded/ moustached & trilby hat-wearing hitman. We first meet him on a dusty and burning hot track, meeting up with a shades ‘n’ bowtie-wearing client, who wants him to take out the black-wearing gang that raped/ seemingly killed his girlfriend on film.
The film shifts from shooting guns at trees in the desert. To a shadowy office where a traumatised old man lurks, onto seedy snuff film sets, onto bars/ restaurants that suddenly clear out, into love hotel rooms, then to shoot outs/ knife throwing deaths. The most constant element here is Shô's PTSD- where every day at 3 pm, a black phone suddenly appears- and he flashes back to speak to his girlfriend before she was killed, naked on a bed.
A free jazz score scores the picture- that moves between angular bass bowings, manic piano and sax runs, and off-kilter mixes of male chants/ jazz dizziness. This, of course, wonderfully adds to the disorienting flow of the whole film.
Inflatable Sex Doll Of The Wastelands truly is one of the more experimental pink films I’ve seen- so I’d say you’ll have to at least have some enjoyment in surrealism and non-formal film structures to fully get what’s going on here.
The Region 1 Blu-ray features a newly restored print. This looks largely very good, with the black-and-white stock being well defined, crisp, and clean. The English subtitles can be easily read. With an even balance between the Japanese dialogue and the film's score.
On the extras side, we have a few new things. First off, there’s a commentary track with historians Arne Venema and Mike Leeder- this chatty & informative track. They begin by talking about the film's alternative titles like Dutch Wives In The Desert & Horror Dolls. Next, they talk about how a film qualifies as being part of the pink genre, and the meaning in Japanese cult of a Dutch wife. We get a bio of the director, and they point out swipes in the film of censorship. They compare the film to both 8mm and Memento, and discuss the career of lead actor Yûichi Minato- he had over five hundred acting credits, as well as having a funk pop career. Later on, they discuss the showing of female armpits, which once again pushed against Japanese censorship. They talk about how creative the pink genre was in general. Talk about the films soundtrack/ it’s creator, and much more.
Otherwise, on the new side we have: Interview with film professor Alexander Zahlten on the Pink Film subgenre in Japanese cinema ( 80.00). Tomorrow Won’t Be A Dream (13.00) video essay by journalist and physical media expert Ryan Verrill (The Disc Connected) and film professor Dr. Will Dodson.
Inflatable Sex Doll of the Wastelands is a heady, at times decidedly puzzling blend of noir and surrealism in a pink genre setting. The new scan here looks great, and we get a good enough selection of extras.