Swimming Prohibited

The first major film from Oki, the pioneer of Japanese queer cinema, is an extraordinary experiment in first-person film-making, related to the Japanese tradition of the shi-sosetsu ('I-novel'). The off-screen protagonist (played, of course, by Oki himself) journeys from the mountain resort Tsumeta, where he has a job in a youth hostel, to the Osaka suburb Suita and on to the sea. He's present visually only when his hands, feet or penis enter the frame, but editorially all the time, since his moods affect what he looks at and his tastes dictate where he goes and what he does. His behaviour is sometimes frisky, as when he approaches schoolboys in the street and asks them whether or not they masturbate yet. But his voiced thoughts are often dark, despite the hints that he's a Buddhist. A movie unique in form, tone and content.