Somewhere beyond the extremes of FATAL ATTRACTION and IN THE COMPANY OF MEN festers this elegantly composed, outrageously violent psycho thriller from the wickedly perverse mind of Japanese director Takashi Miike. Seven years after the death of his beloved Yoko, middle-aged Shigeharu Aoyama (Ryô Ishibashi) decides it's time to shop around for a new wife. But not just any wife: Disgusted by those loud, vulgar broads who gather in cocktail lounges, Shigeharu wants a "nice" girl, a smart woman with a job and refined skills like singing or playing the piano. A woman like Yoko. Shigeharu's friend Yasuhisa (Jun Kunimura), a movie producer, comes up with a plan. He'll put out a casting call for a young actress to star in an upcoming "production" and Shigeharu can sit in on the auditions and take his pick. Shigeharu knows it's cruel and deceptive, but he agrees. Out of the 30 naive hopefuls who undergo the humiliating audition process, Shigeharu chooses Asami (Eihi Shiina), an demure, angelic-looking woman half his age, whom he feels can empathize with his pain; at the age of 18, she was forced to set aside her dream of becoming a ballerina when she suffered a serious back injury. Shigeharu asks her out in spite of his friend's warnings; Asami's story doesn't quite check out, and something about her makes Yasuhisa uneasy. After the first blissful date, love-struck Shigeahru is ready to propose marriage. And during a romantic weekend getaway, Asami makes him promise to love only her... and she means it. Unlike Miike's gut-wrenching yakuza thrillers DEAD OR ALIVE and FUDOH: THE NEXT GENERATION, this exceedingly disturbing tale builds slowly, delivering a few warning shocks (one in particular is guaranteed to jolt you right out of your seat) before exploding in a maelstrom of sadism in which dream and reality intertwine and extreme pain is the order of the day. Miike toys with points of view and it's hard to say which side of the nightmare the film leaves you on, whether the final 20 minutes is the dark fantasy of a guilty conscience or playtime for a seriously disturbed young woman. One thing, however, is certain: You've never seen anything quite like it. --Ken Fox
