Empire of Passion
Director: Nagisa Oshima
Year Released: 1978
Rating: 1.0
One-dimensional, emotionally detached companion piece to the egg-plopping madness of In the Realm of the Senses covers familiar territory: a MILF-y housewife cheats on her rickshaw-operating husband with a younger man, but instead of just fornicating like most people, the lover is convinced they have to kill the husband and chuck him down a well. Basically another James M. Cain rip, offering little diversion from the murdered cuckold sub-genre aside from a supernatural component - the deceased appears in his wife's dreams and in the collective unconscious of the community, leading to guilt and (eventual) punishment. It's of interest more for the surface level details - such as meticulously shot POV shots from inside the well and images of the foggy landscape - than the 'transgressive' elements (it's downright prudish compared to In the Realm of the Senses).
