ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Joseph Perry writes for the film websites Gruesome Magazine, The Scariest Things, Horror Fuel, The Good, the Bad and the Verdict and Diabolique Magazine; for the film magazines Phantom of the Movies’ VideoScope and Drive-In Asylum; and for the pop culture websites When It Was Cool and Uphill Both Ways. He is also one of the hosts of When It Was Cool’s exclusive Uphill Both Ways podcast and can occasionally be heard as a cohost on Gruesome Magazine’s Decades of Horror: The Classic Era podcast.

Official synopsis: A private detective is hired to find a woman who has apparently been murdered in a snuff film. It turns out the woman’s not dead, but very much alive, and he gets sucked into a torrid affair that leaves him questioning his sense of reality. An eerie, seedy, dreamlike noir with fractured, time-bending overtones of John Boorman’s Point Blank and Christopher Nolan’s Memento.

 You want odd? Writer/director Atsushi Yamatoya has you covered with Inflatable Sex Doll of the Wastelands, a black-and-white crime feature that boasts both pinku eiga and noir elements. Fair warning: This one is a roughie, with sexual assault and other forms of violence against naked and clothed (if partially so) women.  

Hitman/private eye Shō (Yūichi Minato) is hired by real estate agent Naka (Seigi Nogami) to rescue his girlfriend Sae (Noriko Tatsumi) from criminals who film their assaults on her and send the reels to Naka. Among the gang members is bar owner Kō (Shōhei Yamamoto), who assaulted and murdered Shō’s girlfriend Rie (Mari Nagisa). Shō’ finds Kō’s girlfriend Mina (Mika Watari) waiting for him at his hotel, and he roughs her up before giving in to her request for sex. Things get crazier from there — as if they weren’t enough already — and at times I wasn’t quite sure what was going on, but the insanity was so intriguing that the film had my full attention throughout. 

Yamatoya, who wrote such screenplays as Branded to Kill and Stray Cat Rock: Sex Hunter, infuses the film with disarming time jumps, arthouse experimentation, and a cool jazz soundtrack. The performances are gripping, even if there isn’t a character to feel comfortable about supporting.

Inflatable Sex Doll of the Wastelands is the type of film that you just have to give into and go along for the discomfiting, eerie ride. You may feel like you need a shower afterward, but you’ll also have seen a historical slice of genre film bravado. 

Deaf Crocodile’s restored version of Inflatable Sex Doll of the Wastelands premiered on OVID on October 17, 2025. For more information, visit https://www.ovid.tv/.