NOKOFURIN TORARETAONNA

Meike Mitsuru makes low-budget pink films for the horny old guys who frequent the fleapit theaters in Tokyo's red light districts. But the relatively undemanding nature of the clientele gives Meike and other pink film directors a fair amount of freedom to experiment - and even to do serious work. One result of this freedom is Meike's Bitter Sweet, originally a pink film released in October 2004 under the ungainly title The Woman Swept Away By Heavy Infidelity. What sets Bitter Sweet apart from the pink run is the pervasive air of longing, frustration and sadness that is common enough in real life, but rare indeed in porn: The heroine Shoko is an ordinary young woman who has ordinary-enough doubts about an approaching marriage. One evening she goes to a small Western-style restaurant with a friend - and falls hard for the cook/owner Kudo, an older man who is accomplished, sophisticated and lonely. She returns after closing time, the owner lets her in - and soon they are having hot sex on the metal kitchen table. The owner, it turns out, is thinking of divorcing his wife, even though they have two young sons. (Mark Schilling)