Koru mi tunaito (1986)

... aka: コール・ミー・トゥナイト

... aka: Call Me トゥナイト

... aka: Call Me Tonight

... aka: Pink Noise Volume 1: Call Me Tonight

Directed by:

Tatsuya Okamoto

At "Telephone Communication Madonna," sexy young ladies are not only willing to talk dirty to you on the phone but also have no issue meeting complete strangers who are really, really weird in person. Frequent caller Ryo Sigiura is one such really, really weird person. Though he's a good-looking young man, he has problems whenever he tries to masturbate. No, he has no issue getting it up or getting aroused, it's just that he sees "lights and birds and stuff..." before passing out and then wakes up to find he's shredded his clothes and his entire home has been demolished.

Despite hearing that bizarre tale, phone sex worker Suuko decides to go have drinks with him at a diner. There, she attempts to cure him of his problem by rubbing her leg up and down on his crotch. That only manages to give him a nose bleed that gets so bad he covers the entire floor with a pool of blood. And then he miraculously transforms into a huge-mouthed monster with fangs, tentacles and claws. Before doing any real damage, he transforms back into his human form. Suuko grabs him by the arm and the two run away and duck into a late night showing of the Corman production GALAXIE [sic] OF TERROR (1981)! He's fine there until the alien slug rape scene comes on and then he transforms again. Suuko moves to the safety of another row and concludes that seeing or thinking about "perverted things" must be what sets him off.

Finding herself unable to just give up on him, Suuko accompanies the monster-man back to a hotel room and hatches a plan to help cure him of his affliction. She first decides that frequent exposure to sex and sex-related thing may be the remedy, so she takes him to a sleazy part of the city, where sex magazines and strippers both cause him to transform. The two are trailed by tall female bodybuilder / photographer Maki and her short, scrawny male sidekick, who takes a bunch of photographs of what's going on. When the photos get back to Maki's sister, Oyuki, she immediately recognizes Suuko as one of her high school classmates; a model student named Rumi Natsumi. Rumi is basically the anime equivalent of the "High School Honor Student by Day.... Hollywood Hooker by Night" lead in the previous year's Angel (1985).

When Oyuki's not in school, she leads up a vicious biker gang and when she's not doing that she's hanging out in a bar chain smoking and sucking down whiskey. These high school gals have quite active social lives! Oyuki finds herself developing the hots for Ryo so she and her gang kidnap him and Rumi and take them to an abandoned building. The plan is for her to rape him while her goons get to gang rape Rumi. But that doesn't go off quite as planned when Ryo transforms into an even bigger monster with multiple heads. The butch sister rides her motorcycle over and shoots the monster in the mouth with a rocket launcher (!!) but that doesn't even stop it.

This 30-minute OVA, which was actually marketed as an ORHA (original romantic horror animation), start out promising enough. There's an amusing theme song and a number of surprisingly funny bits and horror references (including a Fright Night jigsaw puzzle, a knock-off of Weird Tales magazine called "World Tales" and transformation scenes that intentionally echo both An American Werewolf in London and The Hulk) sprinkled throughout. Having the phone sex worker actually try to help the troubled male lead instead of fleeing for her life as most of us would do, is also an unexpected touch and leads to the beginnings of a charmingly offbeat relationship between the two. But the breezy horror-comedy vibe of the first half, which somehow manages to avoid being too mean-spirited, goes away once the bikers take center stage and things become overly serious and distasteful. There's also something just really unsatisfying about how none of the bad guys / gals pay for any of their crimes. In fact, our leads are basically all chummy with their rapists by the finale!

This was first released on VHS by C. Moon Home Video in Japan, as part of a series called "Pink Noise," which lasted up to at least four volumes. Volume #2 is the action / adventure Campus Special Investigator Hikaruon (1987), Volume #3 is the horror / sci-fi Evil Dragon War Chronicles (1987) and Volume #4 is the hentai comedy Body Jack (1987). All of these tapes run about half-an-hour. This one was also released on laserdisc and there was a soundtrack album released by Riv. Star Records.

★★

Dorimu hanta Remu III: Yumegakushi, Kubinashi Musha Densetsu (1987)

... aka: ドリームハンター麗夢 Ⅲ 夢隠 首なし武者伝説

... aka: Dream Hunter Rem III

... aka: Dream Hunter Rem III: Hidden Dream - Legend of the Headless Warrior

... aka: Dream Hunter Rem III: Yumegakushi, Kubinashi Musha Densetsu

... aka: Dream Hunter Rem III: Yumekaku, Headless Warrior Legend

Directed by:

Seiji Okuda

The third installment in the OVA franchise, this follows up on DREAM HUNTER REM (1985) and DREAM HUNTER REM II: DREAM DEMON AT SEIBISHINJO HIGH SCHOOL (1986). Our green-haired heroine, Reimu (which means "beautiful dream") Ayanokōji, is a plucky teenage private detective whose calling in life is stamping out evil in whatever form it takes. Her ability to enter dreams to fight various monsters and demons is what separates her from the pack, as do her two special sidekicks: her orange tabby Alpha (who is able to transform into a large wild cat) and her dog Beta (who is able to turn into a wolf). She also can transform herself into a bikini-clad fighter with a special sword and has a little blue convertible with a hidden missile launcher (!) in the trunk. At the request of an old woman named Ouka Bishu, Reimu travels to the tiny, isolated village of Yumegakushi ("Hidden Dream"), where villagers are being regularly slaughtered by a phantom figure on horseback. Thanks to the thievery of a "dreaming doll" from a local shrine, the resurrected ghost of 12th Century feudal warrior Tomomiko has been unleashed and now he's a killer headless horseman.

Reimu learns the history of the village, about the war between the Minamoto and Taira clans and of Tomomiko, who, as part of the desecrated Taira clan, ended up in the village along with some of his subordinates. There, Tomomiko fell in love with a brave village girl named Yumegozen, who was a dead ringer for Reimu aside from the hair color and may even be Reimu in her previous life. However, the love affair was short-lived as Yumegozen was killed during battle when she took an arrow for her lover and Tomomiko's attempt to avenge her death led to him being decapitated by his own men. Soon after his death, Tomomiko's ghost haunted the village until he and his sword (called "Kusangi") were sealed inside a cave and a doll in the image of his beloved was placed at the entrance. Now that the doll has been stolen, Tomomiko rides again.

Mrs. Bishu has very personal reasons for bringing Reimu in to help: She suspects her own son, Tatsuhiko, is the thief. He's been studying parapsychology at a university in Tokyo and had previously talked about his desire to experiment on the doll. She believes he snatched it and then took it back to the city with him. Reimu heads off to Tokyo, leaving her bald monk friend and protector Enko behind so he can investigate the shrine. Mrs. Bishu's weird long-haired grandson, Onii, jumps at the chance to take him. Onii, who was previously shown attempting to slash Alpha and Beta with a razor just cuz and is deemed a "pervert" by his kid sister, gets struck by lightning before they arrive. Enkou takes him inside the shrine and strips off his own clothes to "warm him up." Onii starts licking Enkou's neck and shoulder, the two caress each other and then move in for a kiss before the camera cuts away (!!) So I was really not expecting to see an adult male monk and teen boy getting it on in this one, yet here we are...

In Tokyo, Tatsuhiko and a colleague, Kido Umimaru, have the doll hooked up to some machine that gives computer readouts telling of the doll's great energy. Tatsuhiko turns out more interested in finding out where a rumored Taira treasure is located, while Kido is strictly interested in observing its possible supernatural powers. Reimu and her buddy, Investigator Sakaki (from previous Rem adventures), show up just in time to witness the ghostly horseman demolish the entire lab. A magical flute that was given to Reimu for protection and that once belonged to Yumegozen, saves her life. Tatsuhiko and his colleague aren't so lucky and are trapped in the lab as it burns down.

Back in the village, Mrs. Bishu gets slashed to death with a sword while deep in prayer, but that killing may not be linked to the horseman at all as it doesn't fit his usual pattern. A man completely bandaged up like the Invisible Man and claiming to be Tatsuhiko shows up to return the dreaming doll, but that little bastard Onii destroys it for no real reason. Just how will they stop the menace now that the only thing that was able to keep the spirit at rest is now gone?

This starts out a little confusing (you may want to read up a little bit about the Genpei War for a little context) before it finds its footing. There are predictable reveals about Mrs. Bishu's killer and the man who's impersonating her son (Reimu's only response to the latter is a voice over proclaiming "Wow! He's so handsome!"), but this also gives us a car chase inside a cave, lots of swordfights and lots of animated gore, including stabbings, slashings, decapitations, the top of a head lopped off and someone bisected and their guts spilling out. Better yet, once the horseman's body is reconnected to the head, he grows to gigantic form (and obviously copies the look of Majin), busts through the top of a cave, goes back in time and ends up on a battlefield with fighter jets and tanks all unsuccessfully attempting to take him down!

About 25 minutes in, there's an intermission entitled "Rem's Classroom" where she discusses the structures of computers and dreams and how they relate and then encourages all viewers to do well in school! It open with a quote from Lewis Carroll's Through the Looking Glass and closes with a quote from the 13th Century work Heike Monogatari ("Tale of the Heike"), whose author(s) is / are unknown.

This was given its initial Japanese VHS release through King Video and later turned up as part of the 2006 set "Dream Hunter Rem DVD-Box 1" distributed by Only Hearts. The running time is 55 minutes. The series sat dormant for about three and a half years but was revived in 1990 with NEW DREAM HUNTER REM: THE DREAM KNIGHTS, which itself was followed by New Dream Hunter Rem: The Phantasmic Labyrinth (1991). There was also a load of tie-in merchandise released like comics, albums, etc.

★★1/2