NEW RELIGION - FrightFest review

Japanese horror NEW RELIGION from Director Keishi Kondo, which had it's FrightFest Premiere as part of the Discovery section, was a VERY bizarre film, which had me scratching my head afterwards as to what it was supposed to be about, or even how to review it.

The story centres around a young lady, Miyabi (Kaho Seto), who is still grieving over the loss of her young daughter, who died in a fall from her apartment balcony three years ago. Now divorced, she still lives in her old apartment, but has had to start working as a call-girl to make ends meet.

But there's something very strange about her latest client, and it's not just the fact he can only speak through an electronic amplifier, having lost his vocal chords to cancer. It seems he's not interested in sexual contact, and is only wants to take photographs of her back and legs.

Asking for her services again, subsequent visits prove the same, with him just wanting to photograph other parts of her body, like her arms and neck, which all seems odd, but as he's paying for it and she's not having to do anything, it seems like an easy enough task.

But then things start to get weird, as she experiences strange dreams about her client. Which is accompanied by hallucinations of her dead daughter still living in her apartment.

Stranger still, one of the other girls at the escort agency, who had also been seeing this same client, goes missing. Only to turn up on the news after killing a bunch of people. With her own mental health declining following each visit, what on Earth could possibly going on with the mysterious client of hers?

A film that raises more questions than it answers, I really didn't know what to make of it. Whilst it's competently filmed and well acted, the plot never really explained itself, so what the relevancy of this creepy client taking photos was, and why the girls he hired started to go crazy afterwards, or even for what purpose, is left unresolved.

It didn't help that the film is also in Japanese language with English subs, so you're attention is divided between what's on the screen and reading what the characters are saying to each other.

That's not to say the film isn't worth a watch, but one I can only recommend to people who like art-house horror films. If anyone else sees this film and can explain it, please let me know!!!

View the Trailer on YouTube.

For more info checkout  the film's official Twitter page.