Forty years ago, an adulterous woman named Natsu (Satoko Yamamura) was caught cheating on her husband with Yusaku (Akihiro Ooshi). After a cult’s attempt to burn Natsu is thwarted, the group decides to pay a house visit and thank Yusaku and his whore of a lover. Nailing him to the wall and slicing Natsu across the eyes, the two cult members think they have won. As a final gesture of revenge, the men slice Yusaku’s face and pull out his eye. Yusaku screams in pain and curses everyone with his grudge. Masanori Inoue’s 2004 horror film Corpse Grudge -crack- has been brought to America by Neon-g as Virgin Nightmares.
Stats
DVD: Virgin Nightmares
Release Date: 1/23/2007
Release Studio: Geneon Entertainment / Neon-g
MSRP: $19.98
Audio: Japanese 2.0 DD
Subtitles: English
Episodes: 1
Runtime: 73mins
Extras: Preview description for Neon-g’s Ninja Vixens titles
Notes: Review is based on a Screener copy of the final product. The video is letterbox (non-anamorphic widescreen), the screencaps have been cropped to reduce the amount of black bars shown.
The violent curse was so powerful that the entire cult was found dead shortly after the men left. Natsu, left blind but alive, disappeared. The villagers moved on with their lives. Forty years later in the Meiji era (late 1800’s), we meet Yokichi (Tsuyoshi Nakano) attempting to bargain for a cheap apartment for his family to live in. The kind landlord Tobei and his wife Nui agree to let Yokichi rent the place at the great price of 60 sen a year. Yokichi is happy to sign, but first the old couple have a warning about this particular home for rent. Several years ago the head of another family living there went insane and killed his entire family. And before that, a grizzly murder happened in the very same home. Yokichi ponders this for a moment, then rushes to sign the contract anyway.
Yokichi brings his wife Chiyo (Tamami Kaneko; The Naked and the Living Dead) and their daughter Aya (Erina Tagawa) to see their new home. Their next door neighbor is a creepy old woman and the other neighbors scatter at the sight of the new family. This is odd, but Yokichi takes it as just an unfriendly group. Inside the home we find a wall with deep cracks in it and holes in four places that look like stake-punctures. (Quiet! Let the stupid family figure this out on their own.) Again, the husband blows off this discovery as nothing major and continues to keep his family in the dark about the previous owners. After all, this place was a steal for the price!
Creepy things begin to happen with the wall. Aya bounces her ball off of the wall when a dark hand reaches out for her and attempts to pull her in. Yokichi sees nothing and again waves off this strange event. Chiyo tries to introduce herself to the the neighbors the next day with no success. Her last stop, the old woman, freaks Chiyo out when she sees that the woman is blind. Chiyo begs her husband to move them back to their last home, but he won’t hear of it. However, to calm her fears he agrees to work on saving money so they may eventually move again. With the suggestion that Chiyo and Aya go visit Chiyo’s parents for a little while, Chiyo finally seems to be calming down.
Chiyo prepares to leave, but Aya refuses to go. Chiyo isn’t happy with the news, but agrees to let Aya stay home with her father while she’s gone. That night Aya is in the closet hiding from the wall when her father comes home… with another woman. Yes, Yokichi is a bad boy and moved the family to this hellhole just so he could screw around on his pregnant wife with a tramp named So-me (Japanese AV star Jun Seto). Aya watches from the closet as her father plays with So-me’s naked breasts when the wall decides to make its presense felt for the husband. The cursed crack reveals an arm which grabs So-me and drags her into the tiny hole, screaming all the way. Yokichi is stunned by what he has seen and curls into a ball for his wife to find when she returns home.
Virgin Nightmares would probably be better suited pushing the horror aspect of the series rather than trying to promote the softcore nudity. The alterations to the original Japanese cover and new title try hard to push an aspect that really isn’t there through most of the film. Otherwise, it stands as a decent B-horror-movie with the occasional humor. Tsuyoshi Nakano’s acting as a horny husband willing to risk his family’s lives to live closer to his hot-ass whore is your main source of everything funny that was probably never meant to be. Although, I can’t blame him for wanting her. Not sure I would risk my family, but I can’t blame him for wanting to nail Jun Seto more often. Nudity and sexual situations are limited to breast shots in opening scenes with Natsu and when So-me comes over for a visit.
Virgin Nightmares is a decent horror film and a lousy softcore title. More one way or the other would really have done wonders for this film. However, as a horror movie, I would say it’s something to check out and possibly add to your collection. The subtitles present no errors and the video looks clean. Extras on the DVD are limited to story synopses of the other Neon-g titles already available on the market. Virgin Nightmares won’t win any awards, but as a somewhat-campy horror flick for a group of friends to enjoy while drinking it’s just perfect.