Kenya Okubo is clearly furious at a lot of things, and much of that anger seems to have been put into “Cosmetic DNA”, a project which won the Hokkaido Governor's Award at the Yubari International Fantastic Film Festival and is playing at this year's Japan Film Festival Hamburg.
“Cosmetic DNA” is screening at Japan Film Fest Hamburg
The story mainly centres around Ayaka, a student who loves make-up and decides to start a live-stream giving make-up tutorials to her viewers. One day, self-proclaimed hit film director Keisuke (who actually just won a minor award for an indie film once and hasn't made anything since) takes fancy towards her and, spiking her drink, takes her to a hotel and rapes her. The depressed Ayaka finds it hard to trust anyone until she meets Satomi, a research student working on developing a female-to-female conception method, and Yumi, a directionless clothes store assistant, that she starts to enjoy life once again. But when it seems that Yumi might be Keisuke's next target, the girls decide to take revenge on Keisuke and, in the process, realise that human blood actually works as an ideal make-up ingredient.
“Cosmetic DNA”, written by Okubo herself, has a lot of things to say, chiefly about women's place in modern Japanese society. It speaks of the treatment women face at the hands of men not just in relationships, but also in workplaces and over the internet. It is very critical of the way women are looked at as mere sex objects or as beings inferior to the males. It also, like a lot of Japanese indie features, touches on the aimlessness of the Japanese youth. While these are all valid causes for concern, the treatment the narrative gives them is too on the nose, in a way that the situations seem laughable instead of grave. Clearly, the cast and crew had a lot of fun working on this production, which has a very off-the-fly feel to it overall, but it mitigates the impact of the points it wants to get across and often works detrimental to the story. The fixation that the “fans” have with idol singers etc. is also another aspect that is explored and probably one that lands the smoothest.
Stylistically, this is a very strong production. The cinematography pops, with its extreme use of colours and strong camera movements making for a heady viewing. Some interior scenes, particularly those in dimly lit areas like nightclubs etc, do tend to be a bit too dark for their own good. While the editing does seem jittery at times and some cuts feel needless, it mostly supplements the cinematography well. The runtime, however, is way too long for its own good, specially since the story gets more ridiculous with every passing minute. The music is a high point, using everything from EDM to Für Elise in a soundtrack that's difficult to pin down to one genre but ends up being unique in itself. All of these combine to give the feature a music video feel, which gives away Okubo's background in the field. Some inspirations from Quentin Tarantino's works are evident, but the overuse of his famous behind-the-scenes “Because we love making movies” catchphrase makes it seem almost sarcastic in nature.
Okubo uses mostly first-time actors and the inexperience shows in the performances throughout. However, it helps that the script is not very demanding of the actors and neither is Okubo's treatment of it. There's an atmosphere of improvisation in this aspect too. Most of the screentime is spent with the three girls and the actresses seem to almost play an extension of themselves, while the male actors seem to have purposefully been instructed to ham up the creepiness.
Ultimately, “Cosmetic DNA” is a feature for a specific target audience and while I am not one of those, even those that it is aimed at would have a hard time justifying the two-hours runtime that it carries. While it is not necessarily style over substance in the real sense of the term, the style here is too overbearing, almost at the cost of substance.
