TrueJoshNight Truly Dreadful Film

Lawbolisted Powerful

Janae Milner Easily the biggest piece of Right wing non sense propaganda I ever saw.

Rexanne It’s sentimental, ridiculously long and only occasionally funny

Woodyanders Troubled young woman Saeko (a fine and touching performance by the lovely Kikko Matsuoka) has a strong psychic bound with her twin sister who was murdered along with several other people on a ship by bloodthirsty pirates. A few years after said massacre the vengeful ghosts of the victims materialize to exact a harsh revenge on the folks who killed them. Director Hiroki Matsuno keeps the absorbing story moving along at a steady pace, maintains a solemn tone throughout, and adroitly crafts a spooky gloom-doom atmosphere. Moreover, the seaside town setting and a dark take-no-prisoners sensibility -- one of the guilty tries to elude detection by passing himself off as a priest! -- further enhance the overall eerie mood. Masayuki Kato's sharp black and white cinematography offers several striking visuals. Only the hokey looking skeletons detract a bit from this otherwise sturdy and satisfying supernatural shocker.

Hitchcoc This is not a bad ghost story, though some better editing and a couple of transitional scenes would have helped the viewer a bit. A group of vicious modern pirates board a ship carrying millions of dollars in gold. They aren't satisfied just pillaging; they kill everyone on board in a cold-blooded slaughter. We now go forward three years to a young woman whose twin sister was on that ship. She has that weird connection that twins sometimes do, feeling the terror her sister felt. One night she sees the ship (even though it had been sunk) and boards it. She sees the ghost of her sister and learns the story of the massacre. She is no bent on destroying the guys who were responsible. The rest of the movie involves her gaining revenge. She lives with a priest who took her in when her parents died. Anyway, it is kind of satisfying. There are some elements at the end that just don't work very well, involving a horrible acid that was invented by the doctor on the ship. It's an interesting effort, better than most of its ilk.

LJ27 LIVING SKELETON is a film I first discovered in 1974 when I read Dennis Gifford's PICTORIAL HISTORY OF HORROR MOVIES. I saw a photo of a fearful-looking woman with a weird skeleton coming up behind her. I have wanted to see this film ever since and now I finally have managed to see a subtitled copy. For those of you who have seen this photo I am referring to, (and from what I can discern, it is the only publicity photo ever used for this movie), I am afraid I must tell you that this shot is nowhere to be found in the final movie and was probably a paste-up created to send to magazines like FAMOUS MONSTERS OF FILMLAND but I am not sure LIVING SKELETON was ever distributed in the United States. I would assume U.S. distributors like A.I.P. probably figured they couldn't translate so dense a plot into English by dubbing and passed on it. That photo caused me to search out this film for years to come and now my search has finally been rewarded. Okay, now that I have addressed that subject, on to the actual movie itself. If you want to be surprised by seeing the movie for the first time as I was, please do not read any further because I cannot discuss the film without giving away certain details. The movie is well worth seeing so if you want to get it fresh, see the movie before reading the rest of this review. A couple of people have mentioned similarities to John Carpenter's THE FOG and there are a few but I personally think they are minor. It might have inspired Carpenter if he saw it but although there are some common elements like derelict ships, fog and priests, that is about the only parts I found to be like the Carpenter film. Honestly, I didn't really understand the plot too much. The subtitles were obviously written by someone who did not use English as a native language and some of the translations are downright hilarious such as a guy being shot at who says, "It is boring". Really? I have never been shot at but I would think it would be anything but boring. The opening of this film seems very similar to that of GHOST SHIP (2002). From that point on, I kept seeing what appeared to be the same people killed and then walking around like nothing had ever happened. Some of the deaths are quite gruesome for 1968, although the Japanese were already way ahead of Americans in their acceptance of graphic violence. This film has wonderful black and white photography. Very moody and atmospheric. There is an air of gloom and doom from start to finish. The plot started off with me able to follow it but after awhile I just kind of gave up and enjoyed the pretty pictures, the fine music score and the nifty gore special effects which while not always realistic are still pretty shocking for their time. Various people get bumped off by what I presume was a ghost but I couldn't tell if good guys or bad guys were being killed. Most of the deaths were not that spectacular until the climax and the climax is a Lu-Lu. It's well worth seeing the movie for the climax alone. It does kind of wrap things up pretty tightly for a movie I didn't really understand for much of it's running time, I must say. Maybe I just wasn't paying enough attention and need to go watch it again - and it's worth watching again I believe. My final verdict on this film is that it doesn't make much sense but you shouldn't let that keep you from seeing it and as for the LIVING SKELETON itself, there isn't one, except in the title. There ARE skeletons mind you - just no living ones. It's the creepiest Japanese film I ever saw.

HumanoidOfFlesh The title of "The Living Skeleton" is actually misleading,because there isn't living skeleton in the film.However the underwater sequence of meeting skeletons is truly unforgettable.The film opens with bang:there is a massacre on board of a ship which predates recent US hit "Ghost Ship".There are striking similarities between Hiroshi Matsuno's film and John Carpenter's famous horror hit "The Fog":a quiet coastal village surrounded by the fog,a local priest with a creepy secret and a ghostly ship with bleached skeletons on board,which haunts villagers on the land.There is also a bit of subtle necrophilia thrown in and a female ghost with long black hair."The Living Skeleton" written by Kyuzo Kobayashi of "Goke Bodysnatcher from Hell" fame surely is delirious experience.It's a crying shame that it's currently out of print.If you liked it be sure to check out obscure Austrian horror film "Dark Echo" from 1977,which may also inspired "The Fog".