Angel Guts: Red Classroom

Angel Guts: Red Classroom (1979) from Tuna

Angel Guts: Red Classroom, or "Tenshi no harawata: Akai kyôshitsu," is the second in the Nikkatsu Company Angel Guts series based on the Manga series of Takashi Ishii. This series, and a brief history of Japanese soft-core porn is covered in the review of Red Porno.

This time, Tetsuro (Keizo Kanie) is an editor of a girlie magazine. He is watching an illegal underground porno film about the rape of a young schoolgirl, and becomes obsessed with the schoolgirl, so obsessed that he even turns away one of his models, Jun Aki, who shows up once a week for sex she can't get from her husband. Through his contacts in the skin business, Tetsuro learns how to find the girl, who is of course poor old Nami, the designated victim in all the Angel Guts films, this time played by Yuuki Mizuhara. She works in a bar, putting on sex shows, and having sex with the more affluent patrons. He manages to meet her, and discovers that the rape movie that had so inflamed him was not consensual on her part, which goes a long way towards explaining why he found her performance so realistic. He falls in love with her. For her part, she is used to people who recognize her from the film, and it has changed the course of her life and inured her. Her reaction is to just have sex with her admirers, then dismiss them.

Many feel this is the best in the series. Think of it as a dramatic and in-your-face exposé of how women can be used and discarded by the porn industry. This time Ishii, the originator of the series, co-authored the screenplay with director Chuusei Sone, who also directed the first in the series. Sone was known for never doing two films in the same style, and the Angel Guts films were no exception. His efforts won him the Best Director award at the Yokohama film festival, where the film also won for Best Actress and Best Supporting Actor.

DVD INFO

Available Subtitles: English
Available Audio Tracks: Japanese
High School Co-ed, Red Classroom, Nami, Red Porno, Red Vertigo
Seven exclusive director's interviews
Five feature-length commentaries
Original sleeve art
Original trailers
Bios/filmographies

NUDITY REPORT

Breasts from Megu Kawashima, Tokuko Watanabe, Machike Ohtani, and an unidentified actress

The Critics Vote ...

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The People Vote ...

IMDB summary. The IMDb score is statistically meaningless (19 votes).

The meaning of the IMDb score: 7.5 usually indicates a level of excellence equivalent to about three and a half stars from the critics. 6.0 usually indicates lukewarm watchability, comparable to approximately two and a half stars from the critics. The fives are generally not worthwhile unless they are really your kind of material, equivalent to about a two star rating from the critics, or a C- from our system. Films rated below five are generally awful even if you like that kind of film - this score is roughly equivalent to one and a half stars from the critics or a D on our scale. (Possibly even less, depending on just how far below five the rating is.

Our own guideline:

A means the movie is so good it will appeal to you even if you hate the genre.
B means the movie is not good enough to win you over if you hate the genre, but is good enough to do so if you have an open mind about this type of film. Any film rated B- or better is recommended for just about anyone. In order to rate at least a B-, a film should be both a critical and commercial success. Exceptions: (1) We will occasionally rate a film B- with good popular acceptance and bad reviews, if we believe the critics have severely underrated a film. (2) We may also assign a B- or better to a well-reviewed film which did not do well at the box office if we feel that the fault lay in the marketing of the film, and that the film might have been a hit if people had known about it. (Like, for example, The Waterdance.)
C+ means it has no crossover appeal, but will be considered excellent by people who enjoy this kind of movie. If this is your kind of movie, a C+ and an A are indistinguishable to you.
C means it is competent, but uninspired genre fare. People who like this kind of movie will think it satisfactory. Others probably will not.
C- indicates that it we found it to be a poor movie, but genre addicts find it watchable. Any film rated C- or better is recommended for fans of that type of film, but films with this rating should be approached with caution by mainstream audiences, who may find them incompetent or repulsive or both. If this is NOT your kind of movie, a C- and an E are indistinguishable to you.
D means you'll hate it even if you like the genre. We don't score films below C- that often, because we like movies and we think that most of them have at least a solid niche audience. Now that you know that, you should have serious reservations about any movie below C-. Films rated below C- generally have both bad reviews and poor popular acceptance.
E means that you'll hate it even if you love the genre.
F means that the film is not only unappealing across-the-board, but technically inept as well.

Based on this description, this is a C+. Top of the line in this genre. Be advised that the genre itself, Japanese "rough sex" films, is specialty material for a small niche audience.