While pitching a story to her editor at Kira Magazine, Asagiri Yuoko (Mayu Asada) is placed on another more pressing story: "Urban Legend #5: The Mystery of the Slit-Mouth Woman." Another staff-writer, Kato, was already on the assignment but he disappeared, and besides being worried about him they have a deadline to meet. Picking up from her colleague's notes, Asagiri follows some leads to the Tamai hospital, a plastic surgery facility where a botched nose-job patient Ms. Hasegawa (Haduki Hotaru) swears to seeing the ghastly Slit-Mouthed Woman at night. Hasegawa warns that the Slit-Mouthed Woman is a spurned lover of a married man, who after a failed effort to commit suicide (thus the mouth accident) was locked up in the hospital's "forbidden chamber," until she escaped and took her revenge out on unsuspecting lovers. After the staff started to disappear, the administration decided to close off that section of the hospital, of course inspiring frisky youth to sneak in for some kinky action. Asagiri was hoping this was just an old myth, but she soon find that whatever is cursing the hospital will follow her home.

This update has a lot to say about our narcissistic and materialist culture, and the greedy doctors who feed off it, more so today than it did when the urban legend was revived in 1979; and it's something that wasn't lost on Hasegawa when she points out, "plastic surgery is all about making money anyway." The film deals with an obsession to make ourselves so beautiful, we run the risk of turning into monsters, and perhaps much more than an exorcism, a self-image intervention can save the day; as we learn the monster's greatest weapon isn't the scissors after all - it's the mirror. This weapon inflicts its damage on women and their wounds are deepened when they feel in danger of losing their men to their younger sisters (as our protagonist has reason to be threatened by her good-girl-gone-bad sibling, Kazumi, played by an adorable, Aiyama Minami).

While the soft-core element is only mildly stimulating (they need to import some "French" kissers to teach the Japanese how to use their tongues), it sometimes adds a Friday the 13th element to the film (is it Part 3, IV, or V that starts out with doctor and nurse fooling around when "Jason" walks in?) If their Kichisake doesn't exactly terrify she's still creepy enough to keep you interested, even if she sort of reminds you of Jack Nicholson in Batman. You could say that she hates to watch people having a good time, but there also seems to be the idea of retribution; not just for her own situation, but an outrage at watching woman seeking validation from men by being touched, despite the fact that the filmmaker appears to be having fun with the exploitation.

The DVD

Video:
Shot in digital video, this 63-minute movie is presented in a widescreen (1.85:1) aspect ratio. The filmmaking isn't the most cutting-edge, but the image quality is crisp and clean. From moody blues, punchy reds, and ominous blacks, it looks good.

Sound:
Recorded in Dolby Digital Stereo, the soundtrack is minimal, but effective. Though I didn't get so many bangs for my "surround" buck, there are solid sound effects and complimentary notes.

Extras:
Birds Of Prey In this short film set in England an old man gets harassed by a group of young hooligans. He's a birdman that feeds his golden eagle raw meat, and then sits in his chair and daydreams about his pet's flight. In his mind, he's adopted the bird's soaring abilities and uses them to get his Hitchcockian revenge on the kids. But we'll soon see that the hunter becomes the hunted, once again.
Pink Cinema Introduction This text explains the origins of pink cinema and
Trailers includes trailers for other Sacrament releases like Hurt, Black Mass, and The Witching Hour
Stills A nice still gallery from the production that include nudes shots too

Final Thoughts:
We are being controlled by our urges to reinvent ourselves, and it sometimes yields horrific results. Unfortunately as much as this film can evoke the creepiness of Ringu it doesn't do the ghost story as much justice as it could have. I'm not sure if it's a weak script, or awkward sex scenes, because Ed Wood did a better job combining sex and horror in Necromania. I would still rent it.