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ОглавлениеKanashimi no Beradonna
— Bennett White —
The important figures of anime’s history are overshadowed by the towering visage of one man: Osamu Tezuka. Earning the nickname “The Godfather of Manga,” Tezuka penned over seven hundred individual titles, indelibly linking himself to the very art form. His art would go on to a second life in the world of animation, where the common elements of his style would be the genesis of the “anime aesthetic” (e.g., large eyes, triangular mouths, budget-conscious animation). His 1963 directorial adaptation of his own Astro Boy manga was the realization of his then life’s work, forever cementing his legacy as the Walt Disney of Japan.
Always a man of incredible work ethic, Tezuka further pushed the boundaries of not only anime style but how anime was made. His own studio, Mushi Production, had branched out from the waters of traditional, wholesome anime television shows—like Tezuka’s own Kimba The White Lion (1965–1967), and into experimental, decidedly adult animated movies. In this spirit, Tezuka and his longtime collaborator, writer/director Eiichi Yamamoto, created a trilogy of erotic animated movies dubbed Animerama. While these three films were thematically related, each kept to their own story: A Thousand and One Nights, Cleopatra, and Belladonna of Sadness.
By 1968, Tezuka had stepped down from his role in Mushi, going back to focus on his manga work. But, his contributions to Belladonna were still felt, even when his pre-production input went uncredited. In his stead, Yamamoto took the directorial reigns, leading Belladonna in a remarkably different direction than its other two lighthearted sister films. Belladonna is an all-out assault on the senses; an emotional gut-check of a movie that pulls nothing back in its depictions of sexual violence. This film is not for everyone.
Loosely based on Satanism and Witchcraft, a largely debunked French historical fiction published in 1862, Belladonna is the story of Jean and Jeanne, a peasant couple in rural France in the Middle Ages. Their lives and livelihoods are under constant threat by the tyrannical Baron and Baroness of their village, who have taxed them and the other villagers into desperate poverty. As such, on the day of their wedding, when Jean is unable to pay, the fee is collected when Jeanne is brutally gang-raped under order of the Baroness. Jeanne is left in a crying, traumatized heap.
Her sorrow attracts the attention of a phallus-shaped Devil, who entices her with promises of power. Hesitant though she is, Jeanne slowly grows trusting of the spirit, who guides her and Jean down a path of relative luxury and influence. While Jean is designated a villain by becoming the village’s taxman, Jeanne uses her newfound feminine wiles to become the money-lender that fuels the Baron’s wartime kingdom. This sudden rise in power has the Baroness seething and she declares Jeanne a witch and an enemy of the village, forcing her to flee into the arms of the Devil. Broken, beaten, and abandoned by everyone around her, she succumbs to temptation and offers her soul to him.
When Jeanne makes her pact, she is oddly confused and disappointed that she—a God-fearing Christian—didn’t turn into an ugly witch. In fact, the Devil insists she has only become more beautiful. After weeks, months, perhaps even years of unspeakable abuse from the village and the sovereignty (despite all that she has done for them), she pursues even more punishment by entering a tryst with the Devil. A life that has been predicated upon sacrifice and violence would know little else, and it takes a carnal act to shake her from the dirge of her suffering and make her realize what she can truly do.
In a stunning reversal of the typical rape-revenge story, Jeanne uses the pact she made not to punish the villagers who chased her out. The cruelty they have suffered under the pious tyranny of the Baron and Baroness, and the devastation left by The Black Death, is punishment in of itself. Instead, she uses her newfound knowledge to cure the sick and lead them to a better life free of the oppressive Christian dogma that has choked the life from them. At this point, the film takes cues from the electric acid-soaked revolution going on in America at the time and equates this better life to free love. The climax, so to speak, revolves around the townsfolk freeing themselves of restraint and releasing generations of sexual frustration. The film frames this massive orgy as both chaotic, and yet wholly good. In fact, it seems that the Devil is not so much the adversary that fell from grace, but a spirit that represents what the powerful Baron and Baroness deemed evil: lust, passion, emotional honesty, and love.
The great irony of Belladonna is that, while this film was created in part by the hands that typified the anime style, it is anything but typical anime. Characters aren’t drawn, they are painted and etched. Jeanne’s face, which the camera frequently holds onto tightly, speaks of the hardships she has weathered. The airiness and brightness of the colors almost appear in conflict with the hard-bitten story being told.
At first glance, the film feels like what would happen if Ralph Bakshi had directed Yellow Submarine: bold, striking, clashing uses of watercolor, all animated in a minimalist but effective manner. The scenes of the villagers unleashing their sexual angst are the crowning technical achievement of the film. Intimately connected bodies writhe and undulate, becoming like the ebb and flow of a river. Organs from both genders fold and stretch to create abstract visions of life and growth. The music is a cacophony of erratic drums, wandering bass, and free-form guitar. The music leads the revelry with every lick and shift.
This marvelous use of both color and sound also applies to the decidedly uglier scenes of the film. The many scenes of Jeanne being assaulted are not made easier to experience by its aesthetic, but they are made more thematically appropriate. During the aforementioned gang rape, we are never explicitly shown what she is experiencing, but her agony is unmistakable. A red, phallus-shaped energy penetrates Jeanne at the base of her pelvis, and it quickly shoots through her body as she cries out in anguish and pain. Along with these scenes, Jeanne herself spends much of the film’s running time in a state of either partial or complete nudity. And while these segments may be considered arousing, seeing as how it is part of an erotic series of movies, the film never comes across as exploitative. The intent appears not to be titillation, but horror as viewers are made witness to what happens to Jeanne. This galvanizes Jeanne’s agency as she lets go of her own personal shame and embraces her own sexuality, and inspires the villagers to do the same.
Belladonna of Sadness is a historically brave film in its willingness to break convention and push past taboo. It forces the viewer to reconsider their personal definition of what “anime” is. In film and on television, the term “anime” is a subjective, aesthetic-based one that undermines the art by forcing the whole of the medium into a single category. Good from a marketing perspective, but entirely restrictive for everything else. Belladonna of Sadness is an anime, but it doesn’t look like it, which throws a gigantic wrench into the gears of conversation and forces everyone to reconsider what anime looks like, or rather, what could anime look like.
One could be more than forgiven if they are put off by the frankness of its sexual politics, or its depictions thereof. It is not a simple viewing, and it was never intended to be. No personal history of the art of anime is complete without at least knowledge of the film: a draining, empowering, beautiful, ugly yarn called Belladonna of Sadness.
Bennett White has been making content on the Internet for a decade, stretching from video games to anime, and has aggregated over twenty million lifetime views. He currently resides in Northern California.
