What a deeply weird, deeply perverse film. And not just perverse for the obvious reasons—the upskirt/“King of the Perverts” subplot—but a more profound, emotional perversity that so many of the characters either engage in (or are subjected to; which is, of course, also a hallmark of his films). Fans of Sono’s work will see other overlaps: the secret society/cult plot; an extreme desire to belong, be loved, give love, preserve love, the importance of love; the chapter/voice-over structure that he’s so fond of using; etc.

(And re: his use of voice-over: Having watched, in the past four months, Noriko’s Dinner Table, Guilty of Romance [the cut version, unfortunately], and Love Exposure, it boggles my mind a bit the degree to which Sono employs the voice-over. The fact that it migrates as the film progresses, from character to character to character, is a great device, but I can’t shake the feeling that it does, at times, become a crutch. Unnecessary exposition of what would be obvious, or at least guessable, without it. I honestly don’t recall from the times I watched Cold Fish, Strange Circus, and Suicide Club whether they too featured the use of voice-over so extensively, but man-o-man, Sono, take a step back!)

Much of the movie also resembles a Shakespearean comedy of errors, where the characters are constantly mistaken about each other’s gender/identity, each other’s motives, each other’s love. This comedic tone comes up again and again in the film, often played broadly (the main character’s near-pneumatic member, e.g.). The film repeatedly shifts tone from goofy/cartoonish to earnest/complex. And it is the movement between these two poles—cartoon violence and emotional pain/perversity—that remains at times difficult to process; the wild swings that still seem, in certain sections, problematic. (Or, if not “problematic” exactly, then at least a problem to always know how, as a film, it is meant to be read.)

It is, at the same time, a startlingly audacious film—audacious because of how directly it tackles two of the most potentially controversial aspects of Japanese culture: religion and perversity. It would take me a while I think to come up with another movie I’ve seen dealing so earnestly with the tenets of Christianity. (E.g., when’s the last time a movie devoted that much screen time to reading and explicating 1st Corinthians 13? And the degree to which doubt—fueled by depression, the flesh, whatever—corrodes any ability to remain in the faith?) Likewise with how much time is spent really wrestling with perversity/pornography/“hentai” as a characteristic of Japanese pop culture. (And whether this is a good or bad thing.)

And then there’s the ever-present question when it comes to a Sono film: How much of it veers off into exploitation—out-and-out titillation? I remember reading a review of Lynch’s Mulholland Drive that argued it was a great film—an “authentic” work of art—but that it was also guilty of pandering. The review argued that the inclusion of the lesbian scenes (particularly the nudity in the lesbian scenes) was more run-of-the-mill “dirty old man” than anything to do with the film’s psychosexual world view … I don’t know if I agree with that, but I do think quite a bit about it while watching Sono’s work. They always verge on that territory, sometimes in service of the greater art work, sometimes (I’m inclined to think) not.

Having said that, the film is epic: epically religious; epically painful; epically perverse. One can only hope that Sono will continue to make such films.