Ginî piggu: Manhôru no naka no ningyo (1988)

An artist rescues a mermaid in a sewer; who develops bleeding sores all over her body, paints a portrait with her oozes and eventually disjoints her.

Director:

Hideshi Hino

Stars:

Shigeru Saiki, Mari Somei, Masami Hisamoto

Cast

Credited cast:
Shigeru Saiki	...	The Artist
Mari Somei	...	The Mermaid
Rest of cast listed alphabetically:
Masami Hisamoto
Gô Rijû
Tsuyoshi Toshishige

Storyline

An artist finds and rescues a mermaid in a sewer. He takes her home with him and she develops sores all over her body that begin to pustulate and bleed. He uses what oozes from her sores to paint her portrait. When he can no longer handle it anymore he breaks down and dismembers her body.

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Plot Keywords:

mermaid | sewer | artist | fifth in series | series | 

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Genres:

Horror

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Details

Country:

Japan

Language:

Japanese

Release Date:

25 July 1988 (Japan)

Also Known As:

Guinea Pig: Mermaid in the Manhole

Company Credits

Production Co:

Japan Home Video (JHV)

Technical Specs

Runtime:

63 min

Color:

Color

Did You Know?

Crazy Credits

At the end of the credits there is a small scene in the sewer where we hear something move in the water.

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Connections

Follows Guinea Pig: Ginî piggu - Akuma no jikken (1985)

User Reviews

Disgusting and vile, Guinea Pig style!

Mermaid in a Manhole is the fourth entry in the more than infamous Japanese Guinea Pig series which tries to be as shocking as a film can be. This kind of trash can be made only in Japan. Mermaid is directed by Hideshi Hino, a man behind the most infamous part of the series, Guinea Pig 2: Flowers of Flesh and Blood. Mermaid is not as sick as the first two entries in the series, but Mermaid is still very very disgusting and "shocking" as the young painter finds a wounded and beautiful mermaid from a sewer and takes her home and places into tub. He begins to paint her as she is unconscious in the tub, but soon she begins to have some very severe symptoms of "melting" as pus filled and exploding vesicles appear on her skin and soon she is FILLED with crawling worms and disgusting excretions and secretions as her slow death comes more and more near..So this doesn't make much sense and all the film has to offer are shocks and a need for barf bag.

The scenes of wet and pus spurting mayhem are disgusting enough, but what I really had difficulties to sit through were the scenes of thousands of slithery worms which are definitely real and plenty, and the girl has them in her mouth, too! What kind of an actress would agree to act in such a role? I'm not actually scared of worms or don't hate them, but there are so many hundreds of them and they are filled with blood and pus and they appear ANYWHERE from the girl's body and they are very lively and active so I simply couldn't watch the film without some disgust reactions, even though I watched the whole thing and didn't use any fast forward. So I definitely can recommend this, if you're looking for something very disgusting and despisable!

There are no cinematic merits in this film (or other Guinea Pig films), although the scene in the sewer is pretty haunting, so that is perhaps the only cinematic merit of the film! Either horror fans like these or then not. Others will puke trying to watch these, that's for sure! Try to show Mermaid to your girlfriend or sister and count seconds how much she can take! It is impossible to give stars for these films, because there are nothing but scenes of disgust and loathing. If you're a fan of Japanese extreme horror and sicko cinema, then Guinea Pigs are worth tracking down as a curiosity, but they are by no means great or noteworthy films, no matter how hard core horror fan one thinks he is. I watched this film (and most of the whole series) as a curiosity and 'cause I'm interested in Orient cinema in its all forms, excluding s/m cinema and other of its kind. As a marginal cinema fanatic, I give Mermaid 5 stars out of ten even though it is pretty useless to give stars for these. At least this is the most disgusting film I've ever seen!