While looking through the filmography of Kenichi Ugana after catching his latest, Incomplete Chairs, at this year’s Brooklyn Horror Fest, I was surprised to see I was largely unfamiliar with a body of work. He’s nothing if not a craftsman, and if the gonzo, gory Incomplete Chairs is any indication, I’ll have plenty of must-sees added to my watchlist. Extreme J-horror, you say? Count me all the way in.

Incomplete Chairs is firm exploitation cinema. It’s Takashi Miike meets Ryū Murakami (and that pair’s met before), a scathing, blood-soaked commentary on modern consumerism and the ineffable pursuit of perfection. Shinsuke Kujo (Ryu Ichinose) is a craftsman desperate to create the eponymous chair. But it must be perfect. Threads of plagiarism and the fluidity of authorship plague him, and for all his talk, the style and form elude him.

Art dealer Natsuko (Ryoka Oshima), soon ensared in his web, helps incite a Lucky McKee-esque bolt of inspiration. Why not craft the chair out of human body parts, a sort of The Chair That Shinsuke Built? It’s set-dressing for ceaseless gore and dismemberment, all punctuated with squelchy sound design and cracking bones. Flesh is stripped and torn, limbs are severed, and blood pools forth from every orifice as the body count rises to astronomical levels.

Comparisons to American Psycho are apt, especially in the austere, alluring masculinity of Shinsuke’s craftsman, though I saw greater parallels with Pang Ho-cheung’s 2010 slasher Dream Home. This is social commentary dolled up in grindhouse fashion, and for all the nascent roots about consumerism, luxury goods, and noxious creative realms constrained by wealth, not instinct, Incomplete Chairs is a gore fest at heart. A montage of nameless bodies bludgeoned and gutted.

That’s not necessarily a bad thing, and there’s an old-school quality to the pitch-black humor and ceaseless savagery. It’s often exploitation for exploitation’s sake, though the nebulous thematic tethers keep it from regressing into nothing more than a practical effects showcase. It’s unorthodox, strange, and plenty nasty, but sometimes we just want to see bad people do bad things.

Incomplete Chairs will only appeal to the strictest of J-horror Dimension Extremes fans (remember those?). Everyone else will be horrified at the sight of Shinsuke, full Leatherface, airing out s victim’s skin in the sun. For the sickos, it’s a decent midnight ride, and a testament to Kenichi Ugana’s uncompromising cinematic style. The chair itself may not quite match the sheer savagery it took to get there, but much like Shinsuke asks prospective candidates (and victims), I’d be happy sitting there for a while longer.

Summary

Sickos rejoice. Incomplete Chairs is gonzo midnight goodness.

Tags: Brooklyn Horror Film Fest

Categorized: Reviews