Horrors of Malformed Men

Jasper Sharp jasper_sharp at hotmail.com
Thu Jul 22 13:38:41 EDT 2010


Its funny you should mention all this, as Midnight Eye will be covering butoh on film and experimental film from the 1960s in the very near future, so you'll soon know more than you dreamt of knowing about Hijikata's film appearances.
As for Horrors of Malformed Men, well, Patrick Macias wrote a fair amount about the film and the reasons for its banning in Tokyoscope, and in the liner notes of the Synapse DVD release of the film. Thomas Weisser's Japanese Film Encyclopedia: The Sex Films has details on the nature of Japanese censorship, and so does my own book, Behind the Pink Curtain. The film was effectively "banned", as it has been suppressed by its own studio since its release, even though it did get passed by the censors, so imagine something like the self-censorship of Stanley Kubrick's Clockwork Orange in the UK.

Interestingly, this film must have got a pretty significant Western release, as the first I heard about it was in Dennis Gifford's A Pictorial History of Horror Movies, published in 1973, which reproduced a still from it.


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> Date: Thu, 22 Jul 2010 13:26:58 -0400
> From: ryan.cook at yale.edu
> To: KineJapan at lists.acs.ohio-state.edu
> Subject: Re: Horrors of Malformed Men
> 
> 
> 
> With regard to Hijikata, wikipedia turns up this (complete?) list of films
> (mojibake shinai yo ni inorimasho):
> 
> $B9HoaL4(B(1964) $B4FFD!'IpCRE4Fs(B
> $BF|K\0E;&HkO?(B(1969) $B4FFD!'CfEgDgIW(B
> $B;D9s!&0[>o!&5TBTJ*8l(B $B85O==w7O?^(B(1969) $B4FFD!'@P0f51CK(B
> $BgA3U2<(B(1969) $B4FFDHx!'@>9>9'G7(B
> $B9>8M at nMpJbA4=8(B $B62I]4q7A?M4V(B(1969) $B4FFD!'@P0f51CK(B
> $BL@<#!&Bg at 5!&><OB(B $BND4q=wHH:a;K(B(1969) $B4FFD!'@P0f51CK(B
> $B2xCL>:$jN5(B(1970) $B4FFD!'@P0f51CK(B
> $B29 at t$3$s$K$c$/7]<T(B(1970) $B4FFD!'CfEgDgIW(B
> $BF|K\$N0-Nn(B(1970) $B4FFD!'9uLZOBM:(B
> $BH\Lo8F(B(1974) $B4FFD!'<DED at 59@(B
> $BM[J*?@k}(B(1975) $B4FFD!'NkB<Lw<$(B
> $BIw$N7J?'(B(1976) $B4FFD!'BgFbED7=Lo(B
> 1000$BG/9o$_$NF|;~7W(B $BKRLnB<J*8l(B(1987) $B4FFD!'>. at n?B2p(B
> $B$A$s$J$M$((B(1997) $B4FFD!'NS3$>](B
> $BEZJ}C'(B $B2F$NMr(B(2003) $B4FFD!'9S0fH~;0M:(B
> 
> I also read a mention that he was a regular at the ATG Sasori-za 
> "salon", a fact
> which might be behind his collaboration at the time with people like Nakajima,
> Kuroki and Shinoda.  Markus writes about his appearance, on death's doorstep,
> in Sundial... in his Ogawa book.  Does anyone know of any other work on
> Hijikata's involvement with film in particular?  Has anyone seen the 2003
> documentary on the Wikipedia list?
> 
> -Ryan
> 
> 
> 
> Quoting Peter Larson <pslarson2 at gmail.com>:
> 
> > Exactly what I suspected. I couldn't see how it could have been
> > released in theaters, but thereafter be "banned" from being released
> > again by some governmental body. Of course, using "banned" makes for
> > better sales than "studio was too weak-kneed to release it."
> >
> > Are there any other films which have made use of Tatsumi Hijikata in
> > any worthwhile capacity?
> >
> > Pete
> >
> > On 7/22/10, Don Brown <ryuganji at gmail.com> wrote:
> >> As I understand it, the film was never banned per se, but rather Toei were
> >> simply reluctant to give it a freer reign due to a perceived risk of being
> >> attacked for being discriminatory against "malformed" people. In other
> >> words, it's the old *jishu kisei* chestnut that keeps it and other films
> >> from being shown or brought out on DVD due to the corporate culture of fear
> >> against potential complaints rather than actual ones.
> >>
> >> Don
> >>
> >> 2010/7/22 Peter Larson <pslarson2 at gmail.com>
> >>
> >>>  That may be a reason why it was "banned", but our question is, who does
> >>> the banning?
> >>>
> >>>
> >>> On 2010/07/22 5:22, Jim Harper wrote:
> >>>
> >>>   According to Patrick Macias' Tokyoscope, the main issue was the
> >>> depiction of mutation and deformity.
> >>>
> >>> Jim.
> >>>
> >>> --- On *Thu, 22/7/10, Peter Larson
> >>> <pslarson2 at gmail.com><pslarson2 at gmail.com>
> >>> * wrote:
> >>>
> >>> Hello all,
> >>>
> >>> To solve a household mystery, could someone tell us how Ishii's superb
> >>> "Horrors of Malformed Men" was "banned"?
> >>>
> >>> Thanks,
> >>>
> >>> Pete
> >>>
> >>>
> >>>
> >>>
> >>
> >
> 
> 
 		 	   		  
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