The Glamorous Life of Sachiko Hanai (2003 - Japan)

Sometimes you need a palate cleanser. Mainstream American movies make too much darn sense! Logical plotting and realistic dialogue can get dull if that’s all you’re exposed to. When I’m feeling like Movieland is getting too serious I turn to Japan. Which is how I recently discovered the weirdest, most whacked out and thoroughly enjoyable movie I have seen in a long time, The Glamorous Life of Sachiko Hanai.

The Glamorous Life of Sachiko Hanai is about a ditzy call girl, Sachiko (Emi Kuroda), who gets shot in the head when she interrupts a North Korean spy trying to buy a small silver canister, the size of large lipstick container, in local cafe. However, instead of dying she pops right back up and, in a dazed stupor, wanders out of the restaurant. As she is leaving the owner hands her purse to her which unbeknownst to Sachiko, contains the spy’s silver canister.

This is where shit gets weird.

When she gets home she decides to explore the hole in her head and sticks a pencil in to see how deep it goes. This pushes the bullet deeper into her brain, and with a psychedelic flourish, magically transforms her into a super genius! Suddenly she has a craving to learn all of the world’s philosophy and immediately heads to the nearest university library to start devouring books.

This is where shit gets even weirder.

Along the way, we find out that the little silver lipstick container actually holds George Bush’s cloned finger. It’s red with American flag nail polish. Sachiko also begins to hear voices, in particular George Bush’s voice, telling her that his finger is the most powerful finger in the world. It’s the finger that gets to push “The Button”. (You know, Theeeeee Button.) It also finger bangs her on the roof of an apartment building.

And here, I guess, is a good time to tell you that this is a pink movie. Pink Movies are Japanese soft-core porn flicks. The sex scenes in Sachiko Hanai, (and there are many) are more goofy then sexy, and granted, the actress playing Sachiko is attractive, but it’s not why this movie is interesting. (Really its not!)

Now bear with me. I’m not trying to rationalize the fact that I was watching soft-core porn. This movie has something to say! And even though what it says is as simple as Bush is an ignorant bully, the fact that it has a political agenda at makes it more then just a trippy skin flick. It’s now political commentary.

Clips of Bush strutting around aircraft carriers in his Texas lawman pose illustrate the director’s views about how the US (and George Bush in particular) is an arrogant threat to world peace. To make his point (and it’s not subtle), the director (Mitsuru Meike) turns the tables and takes it to the most absurd level. Now a Japanese prostitute with a fortuitous head-wound controls the fate of the world. In the director’s eyes that makes about just as much sense as someone like Bush being in control.

This flick is one trippy 90 minute spectacle of mindless sex and gonzo violence reminiscent of the grindhouse, big-boobie soft-core of Russ Meyer cult classics Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill! and Beyond the Valley of the Dolls only this time it’s sprinkled with a little political satire. Anyway, fuck it, maybe I am rationalizing. But, you know what? It’s almost Oscar season, and I’m preparing for the onslaught of sweeping historical dramas and heartfelt bio-pics to begin. It’s refreshing to have some gratuitous violence, over-the-top sexuality and outrageously campy dialogue to help wash down the super-serious dreck that will undoubtedly fill theaters in the coming months.