Hiruko The Goblin (1991) ***1/2
It's odd to think of calling a film as strange as Hiruko The Goblin (1991) "conventional," but compared to Shinya Tsukamoto's feature film debut, Tetsuo: The Iron Man (1989), that description applies, to some degree. It's even odder to hear Tsukamoto, in an interview on Mondo Macabro's (who also released Tsukamoto's great 1999 film Gemini (review) here in the States) Blu-ray, say that he actually gravitates more towards this style of film, but because Tetsuo was so popular (sparking an excellent 1992 sequel, Body Hammer and a not-so-good 2009 sequel, The Bullet Man (review), he continued to make films in that experimental vein.
Perhaps it's partly because Hiruko is based on the Yōkai Hunter series manga by Daijiro Morohoshi, and perhaps it's partly because this was only Tsukamoto's second widely distributed feature film (and backed by a major Japanese studio) that the film does come off in a more conventional sense. It could also be the folkloric background of the story and that the characters presented are a bit more traditional than the outcasts, loners, and freaks of Tsukamoto's best pictures.
Make no mistake, there's lots of creepy, surreal imagery, wonderfully weird practical effects, and director trademarks still crop up. But here it feels more like Shinya is riffing on The Evil Dead (1981) (review), The Thing (1982) (review), and Aliens (1986) (review), while also adapting another's work, than outright creating his own. Tsukamoto is never one to deny his influences though, and Hiruko never feels like a copycat—there is lots here to appreciate.
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