a review of 真实魔鬼游戏

I had previously assumed that this was another Japanese exploitation gore comedy along the lines of Nishimura's Machine Girl or Mutant Girls Squad, but gave it another chance after getting my first taste of Sion Sono a couple of weeks ago with "Antiporno" on MUBI. It turns out that it's more of a metaphysical, subversively feminist/queer mindbender that takes the tropes of J-horror/exploitation and interrogates the motivations behind them. And what it finds isn't necessarily flattering to the genres, nor to the men who make them, arguably including Sono himself. I'm not sure I was on board for the nihilism of the ending (avoiding spoilers) but the ride was wild and surprisingly thought provoking. I'm definitely checking out more of Sono's work.