That was an excellent one.

Nice effects though.

brilliant actors, brilliant editing

Admirable film.

Detective Hoshino investigates a 14 year old case of a brutally murdered maid. His investigation leads him to the mysterious Ukyo. He witnesses him killing and then drinking another young woman's blood. Ukyo is a Samurai who has continued as a vampire. His men take Hoshino to be killed at the docks where he is rescued by vampire Miyako. She shares her blood with him to save him and thereby turning him.This is trying to be a stylish Gothic vampire movie. The film moves way too slowly. The action style is lacking. It would have been cool back in the 80s or 90s. It doesn't look nearly as cool for action of today. The acting is mostly wooden. It's a low budget action wannabe but it fails to live up to its ambitions. The film is generous with its blood flow. However, it is so slow that the tension never gets that high.

This movie is written by Shigenoro Takechi who also wrote IZO, and directed by Ten Shimoyama who directed Shinobi - Heart Under Blade. Aya Sugimoto used to be photographic idol in the '80s. She shows that she still has what it takes in this 21st century movie.A detective who's been demoted to cold case files decides to investigate the homicide of a maid that statute of limitation is about to run out. He goes to see the ex-employer of the maid Miyako Rosenberg (Aya Sugimoto), but find out that she's a vampire.There's no campiness in this movie like they have with vampire movies from Hong Kong. It's rather serious and gruesome. The movie basically boils down to two things. One is view of detective Hoshino as he discovers what it is like to live as a vampire, and the other is the erotic exploits between Hoshino, and Miyako. If these are not interesting topic for you, then this movie is not for you.In Japan, I believe the attraction of this movie was Aya Sugimoto's beauty. Sugimoto has equally large women fan base as do men, so the movie might have been written to satisfy both male, and female audiences.If there's one complaint about this movie, it's that the sound effects are not well controlled. Voices are too low or difficult to hear if the sound level is adjusted to the sound effects.

I was expecting something along the veins of "Snake and Flower" in which Aya Sugimoto starred. I was disappointed. I am not exactly sure what the director is trying to do. The same dialogue lines (Darkness, eternal life, I-am-so-depressed) keeps getting repeated over and over again. There were a couple of sex scenes but except for one of them, the others seems to be rehashes (I mean, same bed, same posture, same lighting, same angle - only thing that differs is the male partner).Not seeing much of emotion/passion either. Everyone is in a state of ennui (except for the male lead, to a certain extent). Not much happens (the pace is unexpectedly slow) and even when there is action sequence the low-budget-looking special effects are quite distracting. No good swordplay or fighting techniques either, they are all pretty basic stuff.So where does it leave us? Maybe it was intended as a "deep"/"thinking" film about love and eternal life? I'm not really getting it. Admittedly, the camera work is pretty good at times, but other than that, there is little for the mind or for the senses.

This mix of sex, vampires and martial arts seems like it will be a decent (if clichéd) vampire pic until the appearance of the first "wire-fu" sequence. Some fairly steamy sex and a scene in which a nude girl is bound and murdered establish an adult tone that is ruined when characters suddenly begin to fight like they're in The Matrix or Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon. It's as if the director (who also did Shinobi: Heart Under Blade) really wanted to make a martial arts flick with plenty of sword fights, but since he had Aya Sugimoto (star of the erotic Flower & Snake films), he was obliged to throw in some gratuitous T&A. The script is extremely predictable, and the characters (with the exception of Sugimoto's young female servant) are unlikeable and keep spouting the same tired lines about how miserable it is to have eternal life. There are also some dodgy computer effects - when a character gets hit by a car and tossed into the air, you'll definitely laugh (the CG effect was like something out of Shaolin Soccer). The are some good points: the movie is well-lensed (Sugimoto usually picks projects that at least have good production values) and the wire work isn't bad, if that's your thing. I wouldn't be surprised if this gets fast-tracked for a North American release, since it's the kind of thing that seems to sell over here.