Campy Horror Film Features Japanese Porn Star Saori Hara
BRUSSELS — Japanese porn star Saori Hara stars in a new sexploitation horror film from director writer-director Jun Tsugita that’s creating a buzz since its showing at the 29th Brussels International Fantastic Film Festival.
The movie, “Horny House of Horror” (aka “Fashion Hell”) is a slapstick romp that takes the viewer through the “sex parlor from hell where customers never come back” chocked with plenty of gore including severed penises.
According to Tsugita, the idea for the film — his first attempt at a horror movie — was spawned from his interest in the U.S. film, “Motel Hell” with bloody scenes that are a nod to gore special effects wizard Nishimura.
The director told twitchfilm that the film in Japanese is called "Fashion Hell" with an extra "S" (“Fasshon heru”).
“And when you transcript it in the Japanese phonetic system, you obtain by adding the extra ‘S’ at the end of the word, the expression ‘fashion health.’ And fashion health is the Japanese name for that kind of whorehouses. So the first idea came to this word game with health/hell. And I always wanted to make a parody of the American movie ‘Motel Hell,’” Tsugita said.
Popular Japanese porn star Hara gets top billing in the film.
Tsugita said, “She's actually famous for XXX, porn hardcore movies in Japan. But she's starting doing more classic films so she becomes popular recently. And because of that sexy mood was perfect for this movie, I decided to cast her.”
In Japan, the director noted, these films are only shown in theaters once or twice for special events so the bulk of his audience are hardcore fans of the genre.
“Most people see these films in rental DVD. I don't have like direct audience response but I look on the Internet the discussions about my film and the reactions of the fans. So I'm very happy to present ‘Horny House of Horror’ at the Brussels festival with this wonderful audience,” Tsugita said.
