This animated exploitation movie from Japanese film-maker and manga artist Satoshi Kon is rereleased 20 years after its original appearance. Based on a 1991 novel of the same name by Yoshikazu Takuechi, it is a broad, brash pulp thriller which isn’t shy about explicit violence and softcore nudity, and some of its scenes are incidentally pretty uncomfortable in our Weinstein age.
A singer in an up-and-coming teen girl-band decides to quit pop music and try to get into acting. But just as she does so, her erstwhile bandmates get a smash-hit single without her. Meanwhile, she can only get small demeaning acting roles – including that of a rape victim. Moreover, the attentions of a crazed stalker send her psychologically over the edge, and she increasingly can’t tell fact from fiction. The action is wrapped up with a slightly ridiculous reveal, which doesn’t quite make sense on its own terms, but Perfect Blue has its own kind of cult pungency.
