Door – Grimmfest 2023 (Film Review)

This piece was written during the 2023 WGA and SAG-AFTRA strikes. Without the labour of the writers and actors currently on strike, the movie being covered here wouldn't exist.

When Western audiences think of Japanese horror films their minds may pluck the likes of Ju-On: The Grudge, Ringu, Audition, or Pulse from the air as examples of the gems of the genre. But there are many contenders for the top spots on watchlists that have fallen out of public knowledge and never made it overseas to our screens.

One such example is Banmei Takahashi's thrilling Door, which was thought lost for more than 30 years and had never been screened outside of Japan. That was until it arrived in the UK as part of this year's Grimmfest programming.

Spending most of her time alone at home while her young son Takuto (Takuto Yonezu) is at school and her husband Satoru (Shirô Shimomoto) works an intense schedule, Yasuko (Keiko Takahashi) finds herself increasingly unnerved by a pushy door-to-door salesman (Daijirô Tsutsumi). After yet another visit from the man, she slams a door onto his hand and unwittingly becomes the object of his obsession as he begins to stalk her every move.

Takahashi masterfully creates a claustrophobic thriller that feels as relevant today as it did more than 40 years ago. Through clever framing and its tremendous soundtrack, the knock of the door, the ringing of the phone, and even empty space are spine-chilling as Yasuko's cosy home where she should feel most space is turned into a violent battleground for the salesman's mind games.

It makes the most of its restricted setting by focusing on the horrifying things the salesman says to Yasuko and her pained reactions to it, as well as the frightening proximity in which they cross paths within the apartment complex. The pair brush shoulders without realising, a fact that seems to make the salesman even angrier and enjoy his cat-and-mouse chase even more as he forces Yasuko to remember him.

But the horror works deeper than that as Takahashi layers musings on the sociopolitical climate of Japan at the time of its release, such as the nation's attitude towards housewives in the eighties and how families were essentially neglected by male figures in the home that focused solely on their jobs. Door can be seen as a scathing critique of capitalism through the salesman and his increasingly disturbing techniques to manipulate Yasuko which ends in a violent confrontation in the home.

The tension that has ratcheted up throughout the film as Yasuko is slowly isolated from those around her explodes in a brutal, blood-soaked clash between her and the salesman as she desperately tries to protect her son. It is a magnificently unbearable culmination of the fear felt throughout Door and leaves the audience's hearts racing until the very last moment.

Takahashi and the ensemble cast take what is a simple, home invasion narrative and create something truly special with its layers of horror, offbeat humour, stunning detailed sets, and quirky cinematography that makes Door a jewel in the Japanese horror crown.

Door was screened at Grimmfest 2023 on Sunday, October 8.