Love Exposure (2008) Review
‘I created a trinity of Perverts, Perv God, the Father and the Son.’
A film summarised by a single quote.
Love Exposure is, for lack of better words, an interesting film. Sion Sono’s 4 hour behemoth deals with a great range of themes through its engaging characters and immersive worldbuilding for what is extensively a film about finally getting a raging hard-on for the first time. The runtime at first seems like a deterrent, but morphs itself into a blessing, as each moment spent in this diegesis is a wonderful time and never feels like it outstayed its welcome.
Obsession is the key theme at play, acting like the octopus head as it weaves and controls each other theme throughout the film. The arms range from love and religion to sex and greed, all interlinking with the underlying tones felt through obsession. This is the film’s greatest strength, always being able to tie itself in with obsessive ideas in some way, whether it be Yoko’s freakish desire for Miss Scorpion, Yu’s dreams of his Maria, or Koike’s pathological need to control those around her, each concept relies on the obsessive nature of these characters and the world refusing to conform around them.
‘All perverts were created equally.’
Similarly, the writing of the characters strongly reinforces the themes at play. Never before has ‘pervert’ been used so much in dialogue, almost as if it works as punctuation in the world of the film. Said world is dark and crime ridden - although the bright colour palette works as a vignette for the criminal world, starting with the illegal activities in the shroud of darkness and moving to the most purposefully obtuse montages of the boys committing felonies. It begs the question of how concerningly prevalent the issues at play are whilst blind eyes are turned. The subject matter here is truly important, yet the film earns its way into treating it in an over the top manner quickly, as Yu’s descent into degeneracy is never glorified outside of the comical Matrix moves he uses to accomplish his missions. However, it is also worked in a way that the audience is almost able to feel judicial immunity in how extravagant the affair is.
As the film progresses from this crime comedy into something much more, it touches a number of genres through its generous runtime and never treats any tone different from the others. Some scenes delve into Miike-esque gratuitous violence with great geysers of gore and viscera being blown into the air, when others become well-thought out bloodless martial arts conflicts, accurately capturing the mood and timeframe, emphasising the developing characters and themes. The large martial arts sequence hits just as the first hour passes and kicks the film into 2nd gear with a fantastic title drop and soundtrack.
Such a wonderful film, expertly shot and paced, oozing with comedy and action whilst remaining important and disturbing all at once. A hefty 4 hour run time is enough to put anybody off but breaking that barrier is the key to unlocking some incredible moments in cinema.
‘Become erect with your heart.’
5/5 - Freddie Smith
08/03/25