Love Hotel

Shinji Sōmai's 1985 Japanese film was produced as a pink film but does something entirely different inside the conventions of the form. The first meeting between Tetsuro, who has lost everything to debt, and Yumi, a call girl, ends in violence in a cheap hotel; years later they meet again by chance. Sōmai's long takes and distant camera keep refusing the intimacy the genre expects; the camera stays even after scenes have ended. The subject is not desire but shame and debt: each character sees their own collapse in the other. It is counted among the films that pushed the pink film template furthest artistically in Japanese cinema. The content is harsh. Who it's for: viewers interested in Japanese cinema of the eighties and Sōmai's formal approach. Who it's not for: anyone avoiding content involving sexual violence, or wanting entertainment from a genre film.