Hikari Mitsushima in Sion Sono's Love Exposure

It’s done great guns on the festival circuit and now, courtesy of Third Window Films, Love Exposure is just about to get its official UK release with a month-long run at the ICA in London this November, with a screening on November 14^th at Leeds International Film Festival and no doubt other dates in the UK to follow. It’s surely a bold move on the behalf of both Third Window Films and the ICA, but (and I’m getting almost tired of saying this), DO NOT BE PUT OFF BY THE 4-HOUR RUNNING TIME! This is the strongest film from Japan I’ve seen in a long-time. Read any review you can find online about it, ask anyone who has seen it. They’ll all tell you the same thing – it’s an absolutely fantastic experience, so intense you’ll be still struggling to assimilate it all for days, nay weeks, after you’ve seen it. The film whips along at such a cracking pace that you’re barely registering the time, and when the interval occurs, it seems like a major inconvenience.

Takahiro Nishijima, the star of Love Exposure

I’ve experienced the film twice already, firstly on DVD while looking for suitable titles for this year’s Raindance, and secondly at Raindance itself. The first time I thought it would take a couple of sittings to get through, but it didn’t take too long for me to realise I was in for the long haul. The second time, at the festival itself, was my first chance seeing it on a big screen, and I was so immersed in it that even then I knew I simply had to see it again, so I’ll most certainly be trotting off to the ICA at some juncture. And this seems to be the typical response. Several at the Japanese guests at Raindance had already seen the film several times. One chalked up their sixth viewing at the festival – that’s a full day in total of Sion Sono’s masterpiece! Another reported their experience of seeing the film in Tokyo, in which during the interval the other viewers could be seen wandering around with ecstatic expressions on their faces, and I couldn’t but help notice a similar phenomenon at Raindance. Ooh, I’m getting goose-pimples just thinking about it. My only regret is that the film was originally meant to be six hours, and Sono had to cut it down by a quarter at the insistence of his producer. I can only pray that at some point we’ll ever get a chance to see the full cut.

Sakura Ando and friends

Not sure what else I can say to anyone but to implore you to go see it. If you’ve seen it once, then see it again, tell your friends what a masterpiece it is. And if you have no idea of what I am talking about, then here’s a quick taster in the form of the trailer.

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