, released in the United Kingdom as ''Screams of Blasphemy'', is a 1991 Japanese cyberpunk

horror film Horror is a film genre that seeks to elicit fear or disgust in its audience for entertainment purposes. Horror films often explore dark subject matter and may deal with transgressive topics or themes. Broad elements include monsters, apoca ...

directed by

Shozin Fukui is a Japanese film director and screenwriter. He has produced three experimental shorts ('' Metal Days, Gerorisuto'', and ''Caterpillar'') and two full-length films (''964 Pinocchio'', and '' Rubber's Lover''). These movies (excluding ''Metal ...

. It deals with the theme of brain-modified sex slaves as well as

mental breakdown A mental disorder, also referred to as a mental illness or psychiatric disorder, is a behavioral or mental pattern that causes significant distress or impairment of personal functioning. Such features may be persistent, relapsing and remitti ...

s in a hallucinogenic thrill ride.

Plot

964 Pinocchio is a memory-wiped

sex slave Sexual slavery and sexual exploitation is an attachment of any ownership right over one or more people with the intent of coercing or otherwise forcing them to engage in sexual activities. This includes forced labor, reducing a person to a s ...

cyborg A cyborg ()—a portmanteau of ''cybernetic'' and ''organism''—is a being with both organic and biomechatronic body parts. The term was coined in 1960 by Manfred Clynes and Nathan S. Kline.

who is thrown out by his owners for failure to maintain an erection. It is unclear in what ways he has been modified beyond having no memory and being unable to communicate. He is discovered by Himiko, a homeless girl, while wandering aimlessly through the city. Himiko has also been memory-wiped, possibly by the same company that produced Pinocchio, but she is fully functional. Himiko spends her days drawing maps of the city, to aid other memory-wiped people. Himiko takes Pinocchio home and tries to teach him to speak. After much effort he has a breakthrough and finally becomes aware of his situation. At this point his body erupts in an inexplicable

metamorphosis Metamorphosis is a biological process by which an animal physically develops including birth or hatching, involving a conspicuous and relatively abrupt change in the animal's body structure through cell growth and differentiation. Some inse ...

and it becomes clear that his modifications were much more involved and

esoteric Western esotericism, also known as esotericism, esoterism, and sometimes the Western mystery tradition, is a term scholars use to categorise a wide range of loosely related ideas and movements that developed within Western society. These ideas a ...

than simple memory loss. Himiko also begins to transform, though in a much more subtle manner.

Release

Unearthed Films Unearthed Films is a U.S. film distribution and production company that imports exploitation films primarily from Eastern Asia. History The company was created by Stephen Biro, Paul White and Rhett Rushing. Their initial releases were the first o ...

released the film on DVD in the United States in 2007. The film was released in a single edition DVD and in the ''Cyberpunk Collection'' alongside Fukui's ''

Rubber's Lover is cult filmmaker Shozin Fukui's 1996 follow-up to ''964 Pinocchio''. Like its predecessor, it is an underground Japanese cyberpunk film, shot in black and white. Premise Often interpreted as a prequel to ''964 Pinocchio'', ''Rubber's Lover'' ...

''. Both releases are currently

out of print __NOTOC__ An out-of-print (OOP) or out-of-commerce item or work is something that is no longer being published. The term applies to all types of printed matter, visual media, sound recordings, and video recordings. An out-of-print book is a book ...

References

External links

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964 Pinocchio
at Horrordrome * 1991 films 1991 horror films 1991 science fiction films 1990s science fiction horror films Cyberpunk films Cyborg films Films directed by Shozin Fukui Films set in the future Films shot in Tokyo 1990s Japanese-language films Japanese science fiction horror films 1990s Japanese films {{1990s-Japan-film-stub