An American is traveling the world in the 19th century looking for a woman he met years ago. His journey leads him to a mysterious Japanese bordello island where “only demons and whores roam.” The man soon realizes his efforts fall short again, but is convinced to stay for the night by the woman who runs the bordello. She offers him a good price and choice of any girl he wants. He chooses a mysterious girl in the back where they proceed to exchange stories. This is where Miike took this creepy, disturbing tale to a downward spiral of brutal violence, torture, and incest in a fashion only Miike knows how to deliver.

We all know this is the very controversial episode of Showtime’s Masters of Horror that wasn’t aired due to content. Directed by Takashi Miike, the level of anticipation for this DVD was astronomical. Usually when this occurs, the viewer is often left very disappointed. Not so at all in this case.

I, for one, am an enormous fan of Takeshi Miike. He is probably my all time favorite director/filmmaker, so my review may be a little biased. Oh well, deal with it. Also, this may be my favorite Takeshi Miike effort. Imprint includes one of the most horrific torture scenes ever committed to film. It truly is difficult to watch.

Imprint is also very realistic. It paints a very vivid picture of what life might have been like in the 19th century. We take for granted now that we have medicine and drugs and other medical procedures. There are a few scenes that I know a lot of viewers will not be able to sit through. It is not very graphic, but the film work during those scenes were nothing short of brilliant.

As like the majority of Miikes work, Imprint is not for everybody. You really have to have a good grasp on reality and have good perspective on difficult issues facing society to really appreciate this film. If you can’t deal with these dark aspects of life, please do yourself a favor and don’t bother watching this movie.

Is it super bloody with tons of gore? No. Miike proves again he can paint an incredibly disturbing picture just based on the story alone. Very few filmmakers can pull this level of disturbance off without throwing a bunch of gore in your face.

Now for the bad. Miike choose to use mostly authentic Japanese actors who did not speak a word of English. The dialog throughout the movie was horrendous (accent wise, not content wise) This wasn’t a huge problem for me. The content of the dialog was perfect so it wasn’t a huge drawback but I know it will be for a lot of people. Also, the acting the American main character was bizarre at times. He did however, look very, very cool and he did not have a lot of screen time after the story starts, so again it was not a huge drawback for me.

Overall Imprint is one of my all time favorite films. A must see for any horror fan. Fans of Asian horror definitely will be blown away by this masterpiece. Bravo Mr. Miike, bravo.

10 out of 10 really brutal cures for hang nails.

This is the legendary “banned from cable television” edition of Showtime’s Masters of Horror series. This one was directed by cult movie maker Takashi Miike, of Audition and Ichi the Killer fame.

Imprint is about a journalist who travels back to a dark sinister land to look for his long lost love he said that he would return for. After meeting up with a strange prostitute, he finds out that his love is dead. How she winds up dead is the crux of this movie.

I enjoyed this episode. I usually dismiss Asian horror as too ambiguous and symbolic, but this one worked for me.

Make no mistake, this is a miserable and brutal movie, totally bereft of anything pleasant. Very strong imagery. The first time I watched it, some scenes intrigued me. The second time I had to cringe and look away at those same scenes. That, my friends, is good stuff.

I was left with the familiar “what the hell just happened?” feeling that I get with much Asian horror, but the brutality and horror of it all kept these negative feelings at bay.

The movie was done superbly. A good cast, brilliant colors, foreboding atmosphere. The Asian characters all speaking English was interesting. I could see and sympathize with purists calling shenanigans on this aspect, but it was all right by me. One, I didn’t have to read subtitles (most likely the reason; to appeal to lazy Americans like myself). Two, there was something unsettling seeing these Asian actors stumble awkwardly through their English dialogue and inflecting wrong parts of words and phrases. To me, it made it even more unsettling.

Overall, I enjoyed this MoH installment. It’s weird. It’s brutal. It’s unpleasant. I still believe it’s second or third in this series, behind Cigarette Burns and maybe Jenifer, Witchhouse, or Haeckel’s Tale. Perhaps I should rank all of these to aid in comparison. A project for a later time. I give this 8 out of 10 prostitutes that could use some classes on bedside manner when describing to a distraught individual on how their long lost love was brutally killed.