As a bakeneko (or ghost cat) film, A Haunted Turkish Bathhouse has some strange and unusual aspects but, of course, here at TMtV we look to the vampiric aspect and the bakeneko genre usually requires consideration on a film-by-film basis. In this case it, to me, might have been listed as being of genre interest (simply for being a bakeneko film) and of course it carries the generic bakeneko tropes. But there was a genre connection I saw that was subtly done.
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| reporting the change in law |
The Kazuhiko Yamaguchi directed film was released in 1975 and veers away from the more traditional period stories (or modern with period flashbacks) and sets itself in a more contemporary part of the past, 1958. This was the year that the anti-prostitution act was introduced in Japan and this law is the catalyst for the film and is mentioned in a newspaper headline at the head of the film.
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| Yukino and Kuro |
In one such brothel, about to be shut down, the manager Genzô (Taiji Tonoyama) has thought of a way around the act and intends to turn the brothel into a Turkish bathhouse (which will have the girls working in it and will have extras). His wife, Utae (Tomoko Mayama) – known to the girls as Mama, asks them if they are prepared to stay and all say yes bar Yukino (Naomi Tani). Having been reminded that any debt might have been forgiven by the act (as debt bondage was used to hold women to the brothels) but it was still a dishonour to not repay it, she leaves anyway taking her cat Kuro.
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| pretend gangsters |
Her reason for leaving is that her boyfriend, Yûzô (Hideo Murota), is moving her in with him. He puts wedding rings on them when back at their new apartment and she asks him to move her country living younger sister Mayumi (Misa Ohara) in with them. They are in a clinch when gangsters (presumably yakuza) break in and demand he pay the money he owes – which he bought the apartment with. To protect him, she offers to take the debt and pay it off – having to return to the bathhouse (at first part time and, after he acquires more debt, full time).
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| Misa Ohara as Mayumi |
Actually, it is all a big scam cooked up with Mama, and the gangsters were his men acting. He and she split the money Yukino earns and he was even given a fee for returning her. He is, all-in-all, a bad guy. He starts an affair with Mama, (rather graphically) rapes Mayumi and, when Yukino tells him she is pregnant (and has refused to have an abortion) he and Mama torture her (again in a rather gritty, graphic scene) during which she miscarriages and dies, they then wall her body up in the basement. It also becomes apparent that he works at the bathhouse (and presumably the brothel before) as a manager – how/if Yukino was unaware of this isn’t addressed. The second act is 6 months later and sees Mayumi (no longer innocent) start at the bathhouse, quickly becoming the highest earner, which draws the ire of the other women.
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| the blood appearing |
So far, no bakeneko action. Indeed the film goes on with its graphic violence (we get another rape, leading to a suicide, and a murder) and intersperses that with an exploitation level of nudity. Kuro, the cat, is watching proceedings and intervenes to save Mayumi from a beating by flying through the air and scratching faces. We also see its shadow loom large behind paper walls. However, it is after the cat is decapitated that we get our bakeneko action. The plaster, behind which Yukino is walled, starts to have blood appear on it, spreading outwards and quickly taking the shape of a body. This is the subtle trope, more often than not in these films the cat licks blood and becomes a bakeneko. This blood pattern becomes the blood connection, creating the bakeneko with the corpse behind the wall.
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| flying bakeneko head |
The wall breaks up and we see Yukino’s corpse perfectly preserved. We then see her head fall and, as she rises again, she has become the bakeneko. This means it is a bakeneko film where the corpse is possessed by the cat spirit, rather than the cat shifting form to look like a human. There isn’t much in way of blood drinking, she is after revenge, but we do get the flying disembodied bakeneko head biting into a neck that then offers a really nicely gory blood spurt. This one might be a tough watch, bearing in mind the rape scenes and is certainly full of sexploitation as well but, despite holding off on the bakeneko action for way too long, I rather enjoyed it and it is definitely something that is of genre interest, at the very least.
The imdb page is here.
On Blu-Ray @ Amazon US
On Blu-Ray @ Amazon UK