964 Pinocchio (Japan, 1991)

Nine Things About the Film 964 Pinocchio

1. This is considered to be a cyberpunk film. I personally wouldn't call it cyberpunk - it's unclassifiable. But cyberpunk is the closest genre to whatever this movie is.

2. It's usually compared to Shinya Tsukamoto's revolutionary cyberpunk classic "Tetsuo: The Iron Man". "964 Pinocchio" isn't very much like "Tetsuo", except in its visual style. It's a very kinetic and speed-edited, unexplainable film.

3. It's about a male sex slave named 964 Pinocchio who can't keep an erection, so his mind is wiped and he is thrown onto the streets. He is found by a girl named Himiko, who has her own memory problems and is trying to make a map of the entire city. Himiko goes crazy, imprisons Pinocchio and begins tormenting him. Meanwhile, the corporation that makes the sex slaves decides they better go find Pinocchio. Then things get weird.

4. Some of the scenes in the film are very creative and unique. There are surreal images and sequences that hit deep parts in you. Some of the scenes in the film are really dumb, and remind me of drugged-out college students trying to make performance art, or are trying to be shocking just to be shocking.

5. It took me awhile to recognize that this movie is kind of a twisted retelling of some of the themes in the actual Pinocchio story.

6. The girl that plays Himiko is not a very good actress. But in a movie like this, I don't suppose it matters much.

7. This movie probably has the longest vomit scene of any movie I've watched.

8. People scream a lot in this movie, and yell at each other. That might be part of the reason why the alternate title for this film is "Screams of Blasphemy".

9. This isn't a great film, but for those people who enjoy cyberpunk, or who like films that explore the edges of both cinema and reality, it's definitely worth watching.  Just don't expect to really understand it.