01
Empire of Passion
Why this pick
Ôshima again turns illicit desire into a feverish, ritualistic tragedy, preserving the original’s stark erotic charge, period setting, and sense of obsession slipping beyond reason.
A FILM WORTH A CLOSER LOOKTHE FEATURE PRESENTATION
MOVIE1976 1h 42m JPN
IF THIS ONE STAYED WITH YOU
Movies like
In the Realm of the Senses
DramaHistoryRomance
CINEHUNCH / THE NEXT FRAME
Keep the feeling.
SIMILAR PICKS / A PERSONAL CONNECTION
If you loved In the Realm of the Senses, try these.
01
02
The Piano Teacher
Why this pick
A cool, uncompromising study of repression, power, and escalating desire, with the same willingness to make intimacy psychologically unsettling rather than romantic.
03
Romance
Why this pick
Breillat’s austere, provocative approach treats sex as a battleground of autonomy and longing, sharing the source film’s refusal to soften desire or its consequences.
04
The Duke of Burgundy
Why this pick
More stylized and tender, but its meticulously composed world of erotic ritual and mutual dependence echoes the original’s fascination with desire becoming an all-consuming private system.
05
Tokyo Decadence
Why this pick
A detached, nocturnal Tokyo portrait of paid intimacy and alienation, marked by the same transgressive art-cinema sensibility and discomforting emotional distance.
Finding the atmosphere, tension and little details that made this one stay with you.
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01 / THE STORY
A little about the film.
In 1936 Tokyo, Sada Abe (Eiko Matsuda) is a former prostitute who now works as a maid in a hotel. The hotel's owner, Kichizo Ishida (Tatsuya Fuji), Sexual assault her, and the two begin an intense affair that consists of sexual experiments and various self-indulgences. Ishida leaves his wife to pursue his affair with Sada. Sada becomes increasingly possessive and jealous of Ishida, and Ishida more eager to please her. Their mutual obsession escalates to the point where Ishida finds she is most excited by Erotic asphyxiation, and he is killed in this fashion. Sada then Penis removal. While she is shown next to him naked, it is mentioned that she will walk around with his penis inside her for several days. Words written with blood can be read on his chest: "Sada Kichi the two of us forever".
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02 / FACES IN THE FRAME
The people who bring it to life.
Eiko Matsuda
Sada Abe
Tatsuya Fuji
Kichi-so
Aoi Nakajima
Toku
Meika Seri
Matsuko