Rope and Breasts

Rope and Breasts (縄と乳房, Nawa to chibusa) is a 1983 Japanese film in Nikkatsu's Roman porno series, directed by Masaru Konuma and starring Nami Matsukawa.^[2]

Rope and Breasts
Theatrical poster for Rope and Breasts (1983)
Directed by	Masaru Konuma^[1]
Written by	Eizō Uji
Produced by	Yoshiyuki Unno
Starring	Nami Matsukawa
Cinematography	Teio Noda
Edited by	Shinji Yamada
Music by	Hachirō Kai
Distributed by	Nikkatsu
Release date	January 7, 1983
Running time	69 min.
Country	Japan
Language	Japanese

Synopsis

Sayo is running a travelling SM show with her husband, where she plays the bottom, and gets increasingly bored with her life. During their tour in Kyoto, they are arranged by a well-off couple who ask for a private show, without knowing that they will eventually be forced for the "real thing".^[3]

Cast

• Nami Matsukawa: Sayo Mayuzumi
• Ryōsei Tayama: Isao, Sayo's husband
• Kazuyuki Senba: Kenzo Kawamura
• Izumi Shima: Taeko, Kawamura's wife
• Akira Takahashi: Strip club owner
• Izumi Sagawa: Girl at Kiyomizu-dera
• Yōichi Takabayashi: Man in kimono (with the girl)
• Saburō Shōji: Kawamura's contact

Critical appraisal

In their Japanese Cinema Encyclopedia: The Sex Films, the Weissers write that with Rope and Breasts, director Konuma has taken the S&M theme—which he pioneered in Nikkatsu's with Afternoon Affair: Kyoto Holy Tapestry (1973)-- to the level of exploitation. In this film, they judge, nudity, bondage, and torture have taken place of a story. Rather than the interesting plotting found in some of Konuma's previous works, the film is a series of set-pieces. "The most salacious finds beautiful Nami Matsukawa floating in a large goldfish bowl as she empties her bowels for the leering crowd of old geezers."^[4]

As Jasper Sharp describes this scene, Matsukawa is given an enema, and then forced into the fishbowl. "She quivers for several moments as she is forced to hold it in, before violently releasing the viscous fluid into the waters, as the spectators stare on mesmerised in a mixture of curiosity and awe, like kids at a birthday party watching a clown conjuring up balloon animals." Sharp uses this scene to illustrate the nature of the softcore genre in Japan. Because of the censorship, we cannot be sure into which orifice the enema is inserted. "Though perverse," he writes, "this scene is not particularly explicit."^[5]

Availability

Rope and Breasts was released on DVD in Japan on February 23, 2006, as part of Geneon's fourth wave of Nikkatsu Roman porno series.^[6]

Bibliography

English

• Nawa to chibusa (1983) at IMDb  
• "NAWA TO CHIBUSA". Complete Index to World Film. Retrieved 2009-08-08.
• Sharp, Jasper (2008). Behind the Pink Curtain: The Complete History of Japanese Sex Cinema. Guildford: FAB Press. ISBN 978-1-903254-54-7.
• Weisser, Thomas; Yuko Mihara Weisser (1998). Japanese Cinema Encyclopedia: The Sex Films. Miami: Vital Books : Asian Cult Cinema Publications. ISBN 1-889288-52-7.

Japanese

• 縄と乳房(1983) (in Japanese). allcinema.net. Retrieved 2009-08-08.
• "縄と乳房". Japanese Cinema Database (Agency for Cultural Affairs). Retrieved 2009-08-07.
• 縄と乳房 (in Japanese). Japanese Movie Database. Retrieved 2009-08-08.
• 縄と乳房 (in Japanese). www.walkerplus.com. Retrieved 2009-08-08.

Notes

1. Infobox data from 縄と乳房(1983) (in Japanese). allcinema.net. Retrieved 2009-08-08. and 縄と乳房 (in Japanese). Japanese Movie Database. Retrieved 2009-08-08.
2. Sharp, Jasper (2008). Behind the Pink Curtain: The Complete History of Japanese Sex Cinema. Guildford: FAB Press. p. 349. ISBN 978-1-903254-54-7.
3. "縄と乳房 (Cast and synopsis)" (in Japanese). www.shinnihoneizo.co.jp (XCes). Retrieved 2009-08-08.
4. Weisser, Thomas; Yuko Mihara Weisser (1998). "ROPE AND BREASTS (1983)". Japanese Cinema Encyclopedia: The Sex Films. Miami: Vital Books : Asian Cult Cinema Publications. p. 352. ISBN 1-889288-52-7.
5. Sharp, p. 27.
6. (in Japanese). P.G. Web Site. Archived from the original on May 1, 2009. Retrieved 2009-08-08.