Saeto (Kikko Matsuoka) had believed that her identical twin died when her ship went down in a typhoon. However, one day, while out scuba diving with her fiance, they discover skeletons connected by chains and begin to piece together what really happened to Yoriko.
This movie starts horrifyingly as we get the backstory: Armed pirates had commandeered Yoriko's ship in order to seize the gold bullion it had been carrying, and they mowed down all of the passengers in a hail of machine-gun fire. In begging the killers to stop, and by drawing attention to herself, Yoriko had made her own death worse.
This horrible truth shatters Saeto's ability to exist in the present. Haunted by the past, she cannot rest until she takes revenge. Her fiance Mochizuki (Yasunori Irikawa) is always with her, to soothe and support, as steadfast a comfort as the similarly sidelined lover in Carlos Saura's 1986 flamenco love epic "El Amor Brujo."
Running parallel to Saeto's deepening madness, this movie descends into confusion and chaos as it proceeds from its stunning opening scene. Though it lessens in power as it proceeds, its message is important. As author Judith Herman has noted in her classic book "Trauma and Recovery," trauma demands to tell its story.
This movie starts horrifyingly as we get the backstory: Armed pirates had commandeered Yoriko's ship in order to seize the gold bullion it had been carrying, and they mowed down all of the passengers in a hail of machine-gun fire. In begging the killers to stop, and by drawing attention to herself, Yoriko had made her own death worse.
This horrible truth shatters Saeto's ability to exist in the present. Haunted by the past, she cannot rest until she takes revenge. Her fiance Mochizuki (Yasunori Irikawa) is always with her, to soothe and support, as steadfast a comfort as the similarly sidelined lover in Carlos Saura's 1986 flamenco love epic "El Amor Brujo."
Running parallel to Saeto's deepening madness, this movie descends into confusion and chaos as it proceeds from its stunning opening scene. Though it lessens in power as it proceeds, its message is important. As author Judith Herman has noted in her classic book "Trauma and Recovery," trauma demands to tell its story.