Synopsis:

Sex Machine aka The Strange Saga of Hiroshi the Freeloading Sex Machine is the directorial debut of Yûji Tajiri who also worked on The Glamorous Life of Sachiko Hanai as a still photographer. Visually the film is loaded with sex scenes that are all intricately framed for maximum effect. The story revolves around a young woman named Haruka whose lover and father of her child abandon her. While traveling on a bus one day she meets a drifter named Hiroshi. They quickly fall head over heels for each other spending most of their time screwing. There bond is put to the test when another man named Anzai declares his love for Haruka.

The film biggest flaw is its insistence of trying to be quirky with a whole subplot devoted to racing crickets. This is a trap that some many Pink films have fallen into in recent years. The best pink films flawlessly mix the sex scenes with the story. The sex scenes in this film feel like they are just thrown in as an afterthought. In between erotic interludes the plot unsuccessfully tries to throw humor into the mix. Even though there is no standout performances the cast is more than adequate in their respective roles. The films two leads Rinako Hirasawa and Mutsuo Yoshioka had previously worked together on the Shinji Imaoka film Frog Song. Ultimately Sex Machine is a mediocre Pink film that retreads familiar ground.

The DVD:

Sacrament presents Sex Machine is presented in a letterboxed widescreen that retains the film’s original aspect ratio. The interlaced image looks a tad soft at times and edge enhancement is kept to a minimum. Colors and flesh tones look accurate. Overall the transfer while serviceable does leave room for improvement.

This release comes with one audio option a Dolby Digital stereo mix in Japanese and removable English subtitles have been provided. The audio mix fares slightly better than the transfer. It is free of any background noise and is evenly balanced throughout. Overall the audio mix is more than adequate in presenting the film as this is film that is mostly dialog driven.

Extras for this release include a stills gallery (6 images) and a brief text essay titled “Pink Cinema Introduction”. Other extras include trailers for other Redemption titles currently on DVD, text information about other Sacrament DVD releases and a teaser promo for the book “Blood & Honor”. Rounding out the extras is a ten minute vampire themed short titled “Blood”. This short film has nothing to do with the film Sex Machine. Overall Sex Machine gets a sub par DVD release from Sacrament.