Reviews

being a huge fan of the dark genius of mangaka suehiro maruo, i decided to check out the anime version of his masterpiece of guro/psychosis shoujo tsubaki. the story takes place in the ramshackle underbelly of early showa period japan. it's the story of a young girl named midori who loses her family and is tricked into traveling with a truly gruesome freakshow circus a la tod browning's 1932 movie freaks (armless man, mummy, sword swallower, strongman, human worm, etc.) and her journey through misery to love and back to misery again. it's definitely not a story for people who don't revel in the dark side of human nature. this anime version captures maruo's original work somewhat well, with an aura of silent film era horror, japanese woodcut paintings of yokai and oni, and a certain dark beauty. the only downside of the film was in it's soundtrack, which was comprised of mostly low-budget synthesizer sounds, although they did use some traditional japanese instruments at the beginning (which would have definitely added to the film if used throughout). if you like psychotic guro stuff (and if you can actually track this down), i would rocommend it to you...