A film about lesbian nuns in 1950s Japan? Look no further than this year’s BFI Flare festival.
‘Impure Nuns’ is a cheap flick from Japan’s Shin-Tōhō studio. Released in 1958 it tells the story of a young Catholic woman who enters a convent after a rape & abortion. Some years on, after becoming a model nun, she is seduced by a wild young novice and her life unravels.
The film is mad, camp as hell, disturbing in its treatment of rape; but at times beautiful and romantic. It bombed on release as it wasn’t sexually explicit enough for its intended male audience but was too obviously intended as semi-porn to be remarketed to women (they did try).
The director was Michiyoshi Doi and it starred Miyuki Takakura as Sister Eri and Mayumi Ōzora as the young novice Anna. The two leads are excellent.
https://whatson.bfi.org.uk/flare/Online/default.asp?BOparam::WScontent::loadArticle::permalink=impure-nuns-flare26
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