Love Exposure
2008 · Directed by Sion Sono
Original language: Japanese
- comedy
- drama
- romance
The story
The story of a teenage boy called Yu, who falls for Yoko, a girl he runs into while operating for the sake of sin as an upskirt photographer in an offshoot of the porn industry. His attempts to woo her are complicated by a spot of cross-dressing - which convinces Yoko that she is lesbian - dalliances with kung-fu and crime, and a constant struggle with the guilt that's a legacy of his Catholic upbringing.
What it’s like
Restless, saturated, and deliberately overwrought, with handheld camerawork that lurches through Tokyo streets, sudden static tableaux framed like altarpieces, and a score that swings from tender piano to bombastic orchestral lunges and pop. Colours run hot and gaudy: fluorescent department stores, pink-and-violet love hotels, washed-out church interiors, and bruised night-time alleys. The mood is feverish comedy tipping into earnest melodrama, a sincere, sprawling romance about guilt and devotion that refuses to stay in one register for long. Its sprawl is part of the experience: long stretches of talky, absurd set pieces give way to bursts of slapstick, fight choreography and sudden confession. Intensity is high. There are frequent sexual scenes and nudity, a lot of crude humour around upskirt photography and cross-dressing, brief but sharp violence including martial arts brawls and some bloody moments, and emotional cruelty within a Catholic-guilt framework. This is not gentle viewing. It suits late-night, full-attention watching, and people who enjoy a maximalist, genre-hopping film with heart, who don't mind bad taste, and who want sincerity arriving through excess rather than restraint.
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