Carnival in the nightCarnival in the night

Of a pair with his 8mm debut Saint Terrorism -- in which wayward youths and sex workers navigate attraction and murderous intent -- Masashi Yamamoto's jishu-eiga (self-produced) breakthrough CARNIVAL IN THE NIGHT unfurls with a palpable sense of rage and abandon, capturing images of Shinjuku's underground and transforming its DIY scene into a purgatorial and claustrophobic realm. Aspiring punk rocker and single mother Kumi (Kumiko Ota) drops off her child with her ex-husband and the world is bled of colour, beginning a phantasmagorical journey of self-discovery and self-destruction; a pitch black look at the margins of society contrasted by a backhanded, yet no less poignant, reflection on responsibility and motherhood.