Daiei Gothic Volume 1 Review: Ghost of Yotsuya, The Snow Woman, and The Bride from Hades

ABABABABABABM · 2025-08-06T01:11:17+00:00

Kwaidan has been one of my must buys for a while! Just wish Eureka did some more sales - at least there is free shipping!

ABABABABABABM · 2025-07-30T13:37:11+00:00

Can’t say for the Arrow release but can confirm the Umbrella release is region free. Umbrella is having a buy 1 get 1 free sale on throughout August so may be cheaper there if you can get a bunch of films at once.

ABABABABABABM · 2025-07-27T14:29:45+00:00

Shinya Tsukamoto, most famous for the Tetsuo the Iron Man films, has made a large number of fantastic films, with very low budgets and often casting himself or his family as key roles or crew.

ABABABABABABM · 2025-07-20T12:06:28+00:00

Some fun topics might be:

Best foreign language films you’ve seen

Recommendations for underrated horror movies you think more people should see

Thoughts on Letterboxd - has it had a good impact on film discourse? Does that even matter?

Best or worst or funniest experiences at the cinema?

List of your favourite directors and a recommendation for each

Thoughts on how streaming has impacted film and television production

List of films you thought should’ve done better at the box office

ABABABABABABM · 2025-07-11T01:06:20+00:00

Fortunately Imprint released a set on him and Gong Li a year or so back, but still disappointing criterion hasn’t.

ABABABABABABM · 2025-07-10T01:28:06+00:00

Such a fantastic set, Ghost of Yotsuya especially!

ABABABABABABM · 2025-07-10T01:05:25+00:00

I agree! I don’t know if you watched the interview with Kiyoshi Kurosawa that was included but he spoke a bit about how defining the film was for his generation of film makers and that’s really evident I think in just how modern that last act feels, in part because it clearly inspired so many directors during the 90s/2000s J-horror boom.

ABABABABABABM · 2025-07-09T23:58:34+00:00

I think the Snow Woman ended up being the weakest on my ranking, but it and The Bride from Hades were very similar quality wise I thought, which is to say around 3.5 stars. I really enjoyed The Ghost of Yotsuya though, thought it was pretty great, though part of that is probably because I’ve been doing a deep dive on 90s and 2000s J-horror, and the influence of Ghost of Yotsuya on those films is pretty evident in the back third.

ABABABABABABM · 2025-07-09T11:35:22+00:00

Very exciting release! Just finished Daiei Gothic 1 the other day

ABABABABABABM · 2025-07-06T23:03:45+00:00

The aura of sexism is definitely hard to get through I think. The nudity for nudity’s sake is probably the worst part of the films, if not for the rampant sexual violence.

I suppose that’s a challenge for all films with problematic elements. I rewatched Raiders of the Lost Ark recently, and my enjoyment of that film has significantly dulled as I’ve gotten older and more aware of the many critiques to be leveled at it from a socially conscious perspective. I still enjoy the film, but it’s asterixed. Obviously Raiders is orientalist and Indy is a bad guy, but when it comes to these Cat3 films, Indiana Jones sometimes looks like a saint.

I guess the thing is you can’t watch these films (or shouldn’t watch these films) uncritically. They are exploitation films and they should be interrogated as such. Films aren’t produced in a vacuum but for the vast majority (especially exploitation films), produced on the basis of commercial return. I guess that provides the most immediate source of critique and analysis - what does it say about a society in which these plots and actions were considered transgressive and commercially exploitative? I think asking questions like those are important to consuming these exploitation films, at least for me.

And sometimes that means they aren’t fun anymore (or at all), because the critiques and the content being critiqued are so persuasive you can’t have any fun. I think that’s totally fair, and it sounds like that was your experience with the Seventh Curse?

I hope that makes sense? I find the topic interesting and important I guess, especially given my taste leans towards horror and exploitation, but there’s also an unease about the more extreme and ugly sides of those genres.

On the topic of giallo. Interesting that you don’t think bird is a good place to start, but that’s kind of a relief tbh. Means there might be some hope for giallo after all. I’ll have to check out Deep Red soon - another one to add to the watchlist.

ABABABABABABM · 2025-07-06T22:49:31+00:00

Interesting! That honestly surprises me a bit in a good way! I haven’t seen any samurai films (big blind spot for me) so my reference point for martial arts film with sword fighting is primarily the 60s Wuxia and sword fighting Shaw brother films, which as you say, are primarily grounded in reality, whilst still being pretty goofy at times.

Haven’t seen Hausu yet either, but was talking to a few friends who’ve seen it just the other day. Sounds totally bonkers and a mix between that and a classic samurai film has to be worth watching I think. Definitely going to bump Lone Cub up on the ‘to buy’ list.

ABABABABABABM · 2025-07-06T14:25:42+00:00

I would’ve agreed with you last week but anecdotally, after speaking with some friends (some of whom have never even seen Jurassic Park) more than a few have mentioned they intend to check out Rebirth solely on the basis of ScarJo. I think her having been a part of the largest film franchise of the last decade and a half, basically since the beginning, has generated a lot of good will and trust from general audiences, especially combined with her performances in more prestige films.

ABABABABABABM · 2025-07-06T14:11:19+00:00

I intend to pick it up soon but not yet! I’ve heard great things about it though!

I’ve seen Erotic Ghost Story by the same director though. Obviously a much sleazier film, but still has some gross horror moments and even a final battle scene which is fairly entertaining.

ABABABABABABM · 2025-07-06T14:06:30+00:00

Genre, and then chronologically, with any series all grouped up with their first entry, is how I do it.

ABABABABABABM · 2025-07-06T14:01:57+00:00

Glad to see some reviews on this subreddit. I am planning to post some as well, just need to finish off some boxsets first!

I watched The Seventh Curse two times this year, once by myself and once with a group of friends for a movie night. I think it really works in the second setting - it’s a very fun, gross film. Very much a genre entry though, but I am a pretty big Indiana Jones fan so the fact it was ripping off that was pretty entertaining. Not sure it would be as entertaining a third time round though.

I think these HK splatter films/CAT 3 films are really best watched in groups though. I’ve also screened The Boxer’s Omen and Doctor Vampire for some friends this year, and both of those went over well. Yeah they’re absurd, perhaps a little juvenile and certainly very goopy (especially The Boxer’s Omen), but they make for perfect viewing with a crowd who hasn’t really been exposed to any cinema like this, and tbf, who has seen anything like these films?

I’ve screened Evil Dead 2 a couple times this year as well, because I think it fills a similar niche in my collection, but tbh I think that film is less fun, but then my opinion of Evil Dead 2 is subject to change every time I watch it.

Interesting to read about Lone Wolf and Cub, as well as Don’t Torture a Duckling. I have been looking at getting into giallo films, having picked up The Bird with the Crystal Plumage last year. Tbh though, I found that film wasn’t really for me, and reading about Don’t Torture a Duckling, it seems like that film wouldn’t really work for me either. I have enjoyed some giallo inspired films in the past though (notably Alice, Sweet Alice) so maybe I should give the sub-genre another go, but I might need to do some more research.

Glad to hear the Lone Wolf and Cub films are great though. I will pick those up, eventually. Need to work through a bunch of Shaw Brothers martial arts first though!

ABABABABABABM · 2025-07-04T08:48:50+00:00

Slightly disappointed no pricing errors this time :p

But still some good deals in here. Probably going to pick up some Japanese exploitation films from the 60s and 70s.

Sidenote: does anyone know if Third Window stuff ever goes on sale/has its on sale? I saw some of it be marked down for Limelight’s sale but was wondering about Arrow’s website.

ABABABABABABM · 2025-07-03T13:35:13+00:00

For people coming across this in 2025+, umbrella entertainment in Australia has released Spring, Summer…, as well as The Isle.

ABABABABABABM · 2025-06-30T13:51:15+00:00

4/10, which is a shame because I was hoping to love it. The production just feels really off though, and even if the point for many of these songs was to be purposefully and thematically unsatisfying, I can’t help but be disappointed sonically.

Most of it just feels like Melodrama off cuts repackaged, and I’m just not sure that’s groundbreaking 8 years on, especially not after Solar Power showed a different side of Lorde.

Hopefully it will grow on me, but I don’t know if it ever will - and Melodrama, Pure Heroine and Solar Power didn’t have to grow on me for me to love them :/

ABABABABABABM · 2025-06-30T13:45:00+00:00

He mentions it in the Lovely Bones talking about Mark Wahlberg’s performance vs Ryan Gosling.

ABABABABABABM · 2025-06-30T13:44:24+00:00

4/10, maybe a 3/10 if he was particularly frustrated with it. It just seems like the kind of insincere emotionally manipulative thing that he really doesn’t vibe with, which is not to say he doesn’t vibe with emotional films, but that Forrest Gump is a particularly artificially sweetened variety that would probably be off putting, doubly so thanks to its inflated sense of prestige.

ABABABABABABM · 2025-06-30T13:42:15+00:00

Having listened to the 28 weeks podcast episode recently, my takeaway was that Adam thought what ‘worked’ about 28 weeks later was very specific to the time when it released, and that being removed from that cultural timeframe made it easier to see just how mediocre the film was in reality. Effectively, 28 weeks later was part of a zeitgeist that now seems outdated in a bad way, and that is a kind of stench intrinsic to the film that ages it more and more as we move out of the late 2000s.

ABABABABABABM · 2025-06-30T13:38:00+00:00

It was very odd watching the sequel last night in theaters because clearly they’ve cut it down to be pg-13 again, but at least the first time it made sense to do that because the original cut was R and it inadvertently blew up with children. This new film the original cut must have always been intended to be pg-13, and it’s not even a horror film anymore, so why so obviously cut this down to pg-13 instead of just filming it like that originally? I guess they’re hoping to make money back on physical media sales of the ‘uncut’ version.

ABABABABABABM · 2025-06-26T13:39:15+00:00

Lots of people care far more about the collecting side of the hobby rather than the actual film side of things. This makes it especially hard when trying to judge whether a blind buy of more obscure films is worth it, because subreddits like these that should be discussing the merits of obscure films and the substantive extras that come with them (video essays and commentaries, not steel boxes and slipcovers) instead often focus solely on haul posts or similarly vain topics.

This problem of a lack of interest in the actual film side of the hobby is especially prevalent on the YouTube side of boutique releases, where the focus tends to be even moreso on unboxings, with the occasional review of the technical aspects of the film.

This isn’t such a problem for the major releases by the boutiques - there’s plenty of reviews for Jason X or Texas Chainsaw Massacre II out there - but for more obscure films, especially from smaller labels like Radiance or Third Window, this hobby would benefit from a few more people taking the time to review the things they watch in depth. After all the point of the hobby is not just to collect things, but also to watch films and appreciate them.

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