Story of a Prostitute is a 1965 film from Japan directed by Seijun Suzuki.
The exact time setting is vague but it's sometime during the Second Sino-Japanese War. Harumi is a prostitute in Manchuria, then a Japanese puppet state. She falls in love with a man, only for him to dump her for a more proper wife. Angry and bitter, she volunteers to be a "comfort woman" servicing Japanese soldiers on the front lines.
So she is driven out with a few other hookers to an outpost on the frontier. There she attracts the attention of the adjutant and battalion commander, Lt. Narita. One might suppose that being the concubine of an officer would be better than screwing hundreds of soldiers, but Narita is mean and nasty, and Harumi soon grows to despise him. (The fact that she gets off during their sex seems to make her hate him more.)
Harumi sets out to seduce Narita's orderly, the haughty Mikami. At first he spurns her attentions but he eventually gives in. They begin an affair which is basically doomed from the start, as Narita won't stand for his favorite hooker having sex with another man. Things get worse when the Chinese attack and Mikami is wounded.
Remake of a rather more serious 1950 film, Escape at Dawn, which was written by (but not directed by) Akira Kurosawa.
Tropes:
- As You Know: A senior enlisted man makes a point of telling Mikami, and the audience, that Mikami was once an officer but he was "demoted for anti-military ideas".
- Black Comedy: An extremely dark satire of Japanese militarism and the death-before-dishonor bushido code. At the end Narita is telling the men that Mikami ruined himself for a woman. Cut to a soldier in the ranks thinking how it's a shame about Harumi, because she had a great body. In another scene an officer talks about the glory of dying for the emperor, while the officer lies drunk on the floor of a brothel.
- Call-Back: A subplot has Sachiko, another prostitute at the base, getting married to a Chinese local. She's collecting crockery and silverware for use in her new home. Near the end she rides back, weeping that her husband is "a madman" and there's no hope of a marriage. Then her little crate comes undone and her crockery and forks and knives spill out.
- Chiaroscuro: Harumi and Mikami are held prisoner by the Chinese in a cave that was at one time a Buddhist temple. The only light is from the sun shining through the cave opening, which makes for dramatic contrasts between Harumi and Mikami inside the cave, in shadows, and people like Uno who are bathed in light when they stand near the entrance to talk.
- Fanservice: An imagine spot has Harumi take off her clothes and run naked across the courtyard, before leaping into bed with the adjutant. Japanese cinema was just beginning to allow nudity at this time (a few years before Hollywood).
- Hand-or-Object Underwear: A scene where Harumi is lying flat on her stomach after sex with Mikami has the corner of a sheet strategically placed to just barely cover her bottom.
- Honor Before Reason: The theme of the movie. Uno, who joined the Chinese after he was captured rather than kill himself, tries to convince Mikami to save himself as well. Mikami refuses, and eventually kills himself with a hand grenade. Harumi is incensed that Mikami won't save himself, although when the time comes she joins him in death. At the very end Harumi's prostitute friend, watching Harumi's funeral pyre, thinks about how their suicide was cowardly, and that true bravery means clinging to life and fighting to exist.
- I'll Kill You!: Said by Harumi in the opening scene of the movie, when she finds out that her boyfriend is dumping her. She settles for biting him hard on the lip when they're kissing.
- Imagine Spot: Mikami's diffidence when Harumi is taunting him for rejecting her advances, is followed by an imagine spot where Harumi runs across the courtyard, taking her clothes off on the way, and jumps into bed with the adjutant.
- Inner Monologue: Harumi has an Inner Monologue moment early in the film where she seethes at Narita's attempt to possess her, and resolves to get back at him by seducing his adjutant.
- Jump Cut: Abrupt transitions between scenes are frequent throughout the film. A nasty confrontation between Harumi and Narita suddenly cuts to her and Mikami, clothes already off, locked in an embrace.
- New Year Has Come: The local Chinese New Year celebration, with a dragon parade and fireworks, is cover for a Chinese attack on the town.
- Painting the Medium: Harumi's Inner Monologue plays over a freeze-frame of her and the adjutant. As she thinks about how much she hates him, the adjutant's image rips into pieces, like a photograph torn apart.
- Romanticized Abuse: Played straight. Mikami slaps Harumi across the face when she impugns his manhood for not having sex with her. Later, she tells him that at that moment she realized she loves him.Harumi: When you hit me, in your angry eyes, I saw that. I am in love with you.
- Together in Death: When Harumi realizes that she can't stop Mikami from killing himself, she jumps on top of him, and they're both killed by the grenade.
