Go, Go Second Time Virgin (1969)

Really Surprised!

A Masterpiece!

Tells a fascinating and unsettling true story, and does so well, without pretending to have all the answers.

It's the kind of movie you'll want to see a second time with someone who hasn't seen it yet, to remember what it was like to watch it for the first time.

A rape and revenge movie that leaves the beaten path far behind, but there was no 'beaten path' in 1969, was there? So, was this the first rape and revenge movie? If it was, then it has its own added set of rules.Main characters Tsukio ('boy') and Poppo ('girl') have charm and charisma in spades, which can be crucial in any kind of exploitation film. The (minimal) references to the Sharon Tate murders (via comics) and sniffing thinner feel somewhat comical, though they must have been big issues in those days. I read elsewhere that this is supposed to be artsploitation - it is the first time I ever read that term, but it's not very useful to me.The story and execution (pun intended? sure, if you want to) are way over the top, but through the eyes of both Tsukio and Poppo, not all that far-fetched. Two outsiders, who are pretty much pushed into taking extreme measures against the forces of evil that have invaded their lives. It is the end of an era in which pretty anything goes, but that never happens without consequences.This is a crazy, bloody, poetic, musical, haphazard trip taking place in, on and around an apartment building somewhere in (I assume) Tokyo mostly in black and white, and it might not be for everyone...10 out of 10 because 'Yuke yuke nidome no shojo' just does nothing wrong (well, if you want to split hairs: near the end I saw the shadows of the camera and crew a couple of times and the beach scene had a continuity goof in it).

Moody, original drama from rebel director Wakamatsu Koji. It takes place in one location and was shot over a four day period. It is incredibly effective as a character study and experiment in style. It is a mix of art-house and exploitation and it marries the two seamlessly.A girl, who is tired of life, begs a shy, troubled geek to kill her. Delaying the granting of her wish, the geek forges a bond with the girl while dealing bloodily with several "problems" of his own.Color cutaways are interspersed with the stark, beautifully composed, well shot monochrome footage. The soundtrack is minimal, the music sparingly employed at key moments.Wakamatsu has an original, anti-establishment perspective that makes his more personal films very intriguing and fresh.

Koji Wakamtsu's "Go,Go Second Time Virgin" is a classic pinku eiga film.Wakamatsu was raised to be a farmer but made his move to the big city and tried his hand at being a gangster and a convict before he found his true calling as Japan's most notorious experimental movie director,who made over 30 films between 1963 and 1974,many of them too raw and disturbing to be shown in theaters but acclaimed at fine-film festivals."Go,Go Second Time Virgin" tells the story of of Poppo(Mimi Kozakura),a young girl raped(for the second time in her young life)by a gang of street ruffians one August night in Tokyo.Left bleeding on a rooftop,she survives the night and meets Tsukio(Michio Akiyama),a fellow teenager with problems of his own.Together they explore the darker side of life and sex,with Poppo's suicidal obsessions matching similar threads in Tsukio's unsuccessfully published book of poetry.The joy they find in each other inflames their rage at the unjust world around them,and their love engenders a tragic killing spree."Go,Go Second Time Virgin" is a beautifully shot film and the cinematography is brilliant.Most of the film is in gorgeous black-and-white,with a few tinted sequences and a full-color flashback to Tsukio's unfortunate orgy experience.So if you are a fan of Japanese art-house exploitation give this one a look.8 out of 10.

Not an easy and an art movie, Koji Wakamatsu's „Go-Go Second Time Virgin' won't let you without a second see, because it's just amazing. But that's not all. There is a natural tendency of considering this movie as a far-eastern one and especially as a '60's -'70's one. More than that (can you imagine) „Go-Go Second Time Virgin' is a strange and beautiful combination Bunuel-Resnais-Antonioni in a Japanese manner. It is true that the movie is violent, really violent, but physical violence is a indispensable element in „Go-Go Second Time Virgin', especially when the same violence is not being followed for any single moment by Wakamatsu. The TITLE signifies purity, and in the beginning, a 17 years old girl is gang raped on a roof, while a boy is watching without participating. The boy remains there, right next to the raped girl till the morning, 8th of August, a warm and sunny one. The girl gets up and, even though she wasn't a virgin, she still bleeded after the rape. It was the second time she was raped, first time it happened on a beach, and from B/W, the image is now cyan. She bleeded for the second time, because she didn't lose her innocence, and directly comes the title, „Go-Go Second Time Virgin'. For the same reason the movie is „build' on and around a ROOF, with many WHITE SHEETS in the 8th of August morning scene. The girl is sad and she wants to die, and the boy, an anonymous poet, pretends that he does not understand why. We go down the roof in a flat where the image turns for the last time from B/W (not a coincidence) into colour, this time, and there is a murder scene with four bodies and a lot of blood. The victims have sexually molested the boy and he killed them for being „pigs' and that's how ABUSE is introduced. From this moment 'till the end, the movie turns into a not losing purity dilemma, and the climax is the night i'm-gonna-kill-you-dance, all WHITE SHEETS are gone and a misty morning on the 9th of August. As for the set, the image and the shot, Tarkovsky's and Kieslowskyi's fans would be delighted seeing „Go-Go Second Time Virgin' a '65 minutes everyday Masterpiece about trying, keeping and fighting for your own purity. The most violent non-violent film I've ever seen, simply BEAUTIFUL (8/10).