Jûsan-nin renzoku bôkôma (1978) User Reviews

Relentlessely grim exercise in purest nihilism.

[HumanoidOfFlesh · 10/10 · 23 September 2008]

"The Violent Man Who Attacked 13 People" aka "Serial Rapist" has to be one of the most nihilistic violent pink movies I have ever seen.Its tone is utterly bleak and hopeless and the scenes of murder,rape and sexual violence are uncompromising.The film chronicles few days of life of cycling serial rapist and murderer.The howling saxophone of Kaoru Abe replaced the voice of the young killer-rapist bringing an inventive contrast to the dumbness of the young man.The loneliness of his lost character is simply overwhelming.The film is cold,bitter and full of despair.Wakamatsu was one of the most radical Japanese film-makers of 60's and 70's and "Serial Rapist" is a clear proof of his misanthropic attitude.10 out of 10.

Jûsan-nin renzoku bôkôma

[RaulFerreiraZem · 4/10 · 21 June 2022]

I usually really love Wakamatsu films but this one just wasnt for me. I get that it is supposed to be really bleak and heavy but after 20 or so minutes it just seemed meaningless. It felt really repetitive and overrall a bore. I think that his films work a lot better when he ties the violence with the political climate like what he does in films like violated angels and go go second time virgin. This one just felt like a series of assault scenes compiled with a cool free jazz soundtrack. Did not like it at all.

Deserving of everlasting infamy

[fertilecelluloid · 9/10 · 1 July 2008]

"The Violent Man Who Attacked 13 People" (a loose translation) is deserving of infamy for it is one of the most nihilistic pink films ever made. A chubby, bicycle-riding rapist/killer dispatches 13 people (mostly women) in a cold, bloody, detached rampage. In the first 38 minutes, 8 people die. Koji Wakamatsu, one of the Godfathers of Pink, makes no concessions to anybody in this grim exercise. The killer unloads his gun into vaginas, a man's ass, arms, legs, and heads. The film appears to be a catalog of murder and rape. There is no humor and no let-up. Only a minimalist harmonica score is heard in the quieter moments between the attacks. Shot on grainy 16mm, the tone is similar to Yojiro Takita's 1983 film "Renzoku Boko", suggesting that Takita was heavily influenced by this film. The relentlessness of the narrative draws the viewer into a process where he (the viewer) becomes anxious about the next attack. As this is a film from the esteemed director of "Go Go Second Time Virgin" and the excellent "Violated Virgins", a poetry emerges from the images that separates it from standard pink fare. Just as the film dryly documents the slaughter of more than a dozen people, so will I right now: 1 housewife is murdered and raped in her apartment, 1 young girl is murdered and raped by the river, a couple are stalked "Maniac"-style while making love in a car, 1 girl in uniform is abducted and abused, another couple are attacked, shot, and raped by the same river, 1 girl is invited to a rooftop where she is raped and shot, a couple are raped and shot in their apartment, 1 drunk girl is shot and raped, 1 girl is killed outside a toilet block, 1 girl is dragged into marshland and murdered and raped. A final girl, the killer's 14th, meets a different fate. It should be noted that the sequence where the killer stalks the lovers in a car has several shots that may have been duplicated by Bill Lustig in "Maniac"; one, in particular, of the killer peering through the window at the couple as they make love, is uncannily similar. Perhaps Lustig saw this film, though I doubt it -- it is quite obscure. This is certainly the first film I know of documenting the exploits of a dysfunctional, bicycle-riding serial rapist/killer and is one of the purest horror films I have seen. Highly, highly recommended. It is a type of cinema that many people fear, yet a small minority admire.

Sixty minutes of sex and death, Wakamatsu style.

[BA_Harrison · 8/10 · 18 December 2012]

The international title for this harsh Japanese shocker from the late Kôji Wakamatsu is amazingly blunt, but it doesn't even get close to accurately conveying just how grim and depraved the film actually is. The central character is an overweight, dungarees-wearing, gun-wielding sex-fiend who cycles around town on the hunt for women to rape and kill (or kill and then rape—he's not fussy in which order he does things). Displaying zero compassion for his victims, the rotund rapist works his way through a series of attractive females (some of whom are with their boyfriend when he strikes, resulting in even more murder and mayhem) before finally being machine-gunned down by the police.

I guess it could be claimed that there is a hint of black humour in the unlikely way that the chubby chap repeatedly happens upon fit, helpless young women in the middle of nowhere, but the lasting impression of the film is undoubtedly one of utter bleakness, the random acts of violence made all the more chilling by the misanthropic manner in which he dispatches of his already violated victims, shooting them in the head, genitals or ass for maximum effect. The unexpected killing of one particular victim, a brave policewoman that the lustful lard-ass keeps tied up in his ramshackle home, is especially shocking.

While not exactly what you would describe as a fun film, Serial Rapist is an undeniably powerful one, an exercise in pure nihilistic nastiness that all fans of extreme Asian cinema should seek out.