Original Title: Ai no mukidashi | 愛のむきだし
Release: 2008
Country: Japan
Director: Sion Sono
Cast: Takahiro Nishijima / Hikari Mitsushima
Running Time: 237 Min.
Written by M. Douglas
Published: 09/02/09
A 4-hour film, director Sion Sono’s Love Expsoure delivers an exposé on the numerous forms of what constitutes “perverseness” within a Japanese—and to a certain extent—universal society. These are all attributes that befall humanity and Sono wants to showcase this human frailty with his latest cinematic spectacle.
The story follows Yu Tsunoda (Takahiro Nishijima), a young teenage catholic attempting to live his life in a faithful and orderly manner. His father, Tetsu (Atsuro Watabe), has since become a devout catholic priest stemming from the passing of Yu’s mother and operates his own church. When a lone stranggler by the name of Saori (Makiko Watanabe) begins attending services at Tetsu’s church, she slowly begins to seduce him, ultimately leading him towards the path of being noncelibate. Yu unwillingly accepts his father’s newfound relationship, but drastic changes begin to unfold when Tetsu and Saori’s relationship unexpectedly ends. Tetsu returns back to the priesthood, but Yu notices that his father has changed dramatically. We find Tetsu constantly ordering Yu to attend confessional everyday because he believes he has sinned, and when Yu admits he tries to avoid sinful behavior, his father doesn’t believe him. Fed up, we find Tetsu leaving home and living at the church in which the only way for Yu to communicate with his father is through confession. Yu vigorously begins his journey to perform sinful behavior in order to speak to his father and he eventually becomes entangled with a mysterious girl named Koike (Sakura Ando), who is a recruiter for a cult named “The Church of Zero”, and another girl by the name of Yoko (Hikari Mitsushima), who he admires immensely…
Previous films by Sono have all explored the intricate workings of the family unit and how it fluctuates tremendously due to externalities that are seemingly out of their ability to control. His 2005 film Noriko’s Dinner Table, dealt heavily with this topic. Sono’s Love Expsoure cultivates many of those elements to deliver something entirely unique in its own right. The issue of perverseness and its correlation to sexuality is a heavy theme in the plot, but we slowly see that perverseness can also be applied in a non-sexual way to many of the actions taken by the characters within the film, whether it be perverseness of the family, gender roles, and even religion.
Similar to Noriko’s Dinner Table, Sono splices the film into chapters, each specifically focusing on a singular character and their background and rationale. Given the extensive running time of the film, this works our exceptionally well and we actually get to know the characters, especially to the point of understanding the decisions they make within the film. This narrative perspective is very important in providing a rather intimate feeling towards the characters and plot overall. Sono is even able to provide a number of humorous moments within the film, and given the context of the material at hand, this is a breath of fresh air.
Similar to his previous films, Love Expsoure has an extremely well rounded and capable cast. Sono is able to derive such powerful performances from his actors and actresses; it’s amazing to see the range of emotions on display. The developmental transformations of literally the entire cast throughout the course of the film is fantastic, specifically that of the character Yu played by Takahiro Nishijima. The struggle he undertakes throughout the film to remedy his dysfunctional family is mesmerizing to watch. Similar to his performance, we have both Hikari Mitsushima and Sakura Ando, both who we see in the film as individuals who grew up with tremendous hardships, and were able to effectively convey the aftermath of those hardships through their excellent acting abilities. We then find Yu’s family—his father played by Atsuro Watabe and stepmother played by Makiko Watanabe—who are engaging as the misled couple attempting to live a normal life through unordinary means. The exceptional acting is so vividly on display it’s something that one can almost expect given Sono’s previous works.
Love Expsoure is a film that addresses numerous societal issues, but is able to balance it in such as way as to combine both humor and sternness to portray the issues at hand. It’s a rambunctious and entertaining film, but doesn’t forget allocate to it’s time towards showcasing the viewers contemplative issues such as religious hypocrisy, mental illness, group thinking, and the fragmented family structure. Adventurously relentless in its 4-hour running time, Love Expsoure is the epitome of director Sono’s works and what he can offer to an audience. An absolute pleasure to watch, it’s a film I highly recommend.
SIDENOTE: Director Sion Sono had the original running time allotted at six hours, but the producers of the film said it would be near impossible to showcase in a theater. Sono then went back and edited the film down to two hours, but felt that the film was nearly incomprehensible at that state, so he edited it back up to its current running time of 4 hours. He currently has no plans to release any other version.
