I was so impressed after watching Koji Wakamatsu’s Go, Go Second Time Virgin (review) that I’ve really made a point to seek out more of his work as well as read up on him as a director. Firstly, the man was a workhorse, much in the vein of Takashi Miike, making well over 35 films a decade in the 60s and 70s (including a dizzying 20 between 1963 and 1965!). He was also firmly entrenched in making films on his terms and in his own way, going so far as bailing on a lucrative contract with Japanese studio Nikkatsu when they handled his first foray into the Pink genre poorly, due to fear of retaliation from the government. So he decided to self-finance his films, creating his own Wakamatsu Studios, and The Embryo Hunts in Secret was its first production. Wakamatsu obviously knew what was good for him creatively, because more than just having a cool title, The Embryo Hunts in Secret is a claustrophobic nightmare that regardless of being his first foray into independently produced cinema is just as effective and assured as his later work.

The film starts out with a department store owner, whose name we never get, out on a date with one of his sales girls, Yuka. Things get hot and heavy in a car outside of his house, but Yuka wants to take things inside. Once in the house, the man asks Yuka some bizarre questions about how many men she has been with and does she realize how much she looks like “her”. Amidst all of this, Yuka is still attracted to the man, and they have sex. Afterwards, the man gives Yuka a sleeping pill, as she needs to be up early the next day for another date. Once Yuka is asleep, the man ties her to the bed and begins to whip her. As the whipping goes on, the man speaks about how his mother hung herself due to the war and how his wife left him because she wanted a baby while he didn’t. His goal seems to be to force Yuka into loving him the way he wants to be loved.

Upon waking, Yuka is shocked to see the bruises and lash marks all over her body. The man tosses money at her and says she was worth it. Yuka goes to leave, but the man freaks and runs at Yuka, begging her not to leave. Yuka turns him down by insulting his character, so the man forcefully brings Yuka back into the bedroom and ties her up once again, essentially now holding her against her will. During a period of time, the man begins to “train” Yuka through abuse and degradation, attempting to make Yuka his “dog”, one that will love him unconditionally. Unfortunately, he may just be training Yuka to become a dog that’s just as rabid as he is.

Far ahead of its time, The Embryo Hunts in Secret is essentially what many modern audiences call “torture porn” or its Japanese equivalent “J-Sploitation”, done arthouse style. Not content with just being exploitive, Wakamatsu is much more concerned with showing the mental instability of the male character. He’s not just another crazy guy with no real motivations. His mother committed suicide, and he blames himself. Because of that, he never wanted to father a child himself, and his wife leaves him over it. He does what he does because he feels that it’s only through violence that he can get a woman to love him the way he wants to be loved, as playing nice didn’t work before. Frankly, because of the reactionary actions of the man towards women in general, the film is much less sadistic towards the woman than most of these films are criticized of being. The woman’s actions are what are controlling the emotions of the man, and she can basically manipulate him any way she wants once she realizes this.

Stylistically, the film is a beast. Taking place in a small, one-bedroom apartment, the film is extremely claustrophobic, and in this confined setting, the tension between the characters is all the more heightened. Like Go, Go Second Time Virgin, the film is poetic in tone, as well as dialogue. It works somewhat better here though, considering the mentally warped state of the man and his views on birth, women and the world at large. Once again Wakamatsu chooses a score one wouldn’t expect, one of the classical breed, effectively creating something unique and all his own. His trademark bleak-looking black and white cinematography is again wonderfully realized, with stylistic flourishes of dropped-out audio and bleached-out frames to indicate flashbacks and time lapses.

Wakamatsu once again proves here that he laughs in the face of convention and is a master of creating something utterly unique in the confines of something that really shouldn’t be. For better or worse, he paved the way for the likes of J-Sploitation directors such as Daisuke Yamanouchi and series like Guinea Pig, but he completely embarrasses them with a take on depraved material akin to other masters of provocative cinema such as Michael Haneke or Pier Paolo Pasolini. Certainly not for the weak of heart, anyone looking for taboo-breaking cinema done right should look no further than Koji Wakamatsu. The Embryo Hunts in Secret was only the beginning of Wakamatsu’s creative freedom, and over 40 years later there’s scarcely anyone else who can do the style better.