Yasuko, a housewife, lives in an urban high-rise apartment with her husband Satoru and her son Takuto. Annoyed by spam calls and door-to-door salesmen, Yasuko slams the door on a salesman’s hand when he tries to squeeze a flyer through the apartment's chained front door. He leaves, but the next day, her nightmare starts.
Doa, ドア, Dver', ＤＯＯＲ, 门, DOOR, 도어
Japan
Tokyo International Film Festival (Digitally Remastered Version)
South Korea15
Bucheon International Fantastic Film Festival
USA
Fantastic Fest
Colombia
Fantasmagoría - Festival de Cine Fantástico y de Terror de Medellín
Finland
Night Visions Film Festival
Japan
Colombia
Finland
Japan
South Korea
USA
Oh man, Door is such a weird, weird film. It could easily be written off as a basic home invasion film, but it takes such an idiosyncratic approach to its execution. First, there's the film's basic structure. It is deceptively simple. It gives us dry, simple scenes and builds tension very quietly as the film's antagonist, an angry door-to-door salesman, starts to force his way into a very 80s housewife's life. It's almost Haneke-esque. But then the film fucking explodes in its final act, going to slapstick levels of violence. I shouted with shock and glee a few times at the screen. As strange as the film is, there's a real sense of truth to the themes wrapped around its…
Stone cold classic Yuppie Thriller, in which a well-to-do housewife is stalked by a door-to-door salesman she accidentally angered. Writer/Director Banmei Takahashi plays it pretty close to the vest at first, with a psychological siege of lewd phone calls, stalking, and police officers who don't care, but he keeps things fresh with tons of little stylistic touches (like the protagonist only hearing men's voices coming through a phone line, even if they're right in front of her), before unleashing a gory BOOD SIMPLE-style finale. Keiko Takahashi carries it on her shoulders, fluctuating through so many emotional registers, in what could have easily been the story of a victim being terrified through most of the running time.
#SlasherSaturday
Really well done home invasion, stalker/thriller. Feels like a thinly veiled jab at telemarketers and door-to-door salesman. I simultaneously really liked and hated the ending. On one hand the chase through the apartment with the overhead POV panning from room to room was a really awesome shot. On the other hand, typical frustrating character decisions stretch believability. Like, how is your first action after exiting the bathroom not to call the cops. I ain’t tucking my son gently into bed until I know 1000% where Rapey McRaperson is. Maybe that’s just me though. Solid thriller, even though it’s light on the slashing.
Degrees of Kevin Bacon: 3
1. Keiko Takahashi and Hideo Murota in Lake of Illusions
2. Hideo Murota and Diane Lane in The Setting Sun
3. Diane Lane and Kevin Bacon in My Dog Skip
Felt like Chantal Akerman doing REPULSION.
There’s a sequence towards the end that was cinematically dazzling.
Even 80’s Japan hated spam calls and spam mail
I like most people had never heard of this until it played at a film festival in Brooklyn back two years ago. The circumstances of how it was feared “lost” then it was “found” again are unknown to me; nevertheless, Screambox has the movie available to stream on a variety of different platforms.
Some have described it as “a psychological thriller”; the differences between that genre and horror are a road I’d rather not go down. A film where a vulnerable woman is harassed by a creepy dude will be terrifying to some. In this case, Yasuko lives in a Tokyo apartment w/ a work-weary husband and a high-spirited young son.…
Japanese Arts & Culture Discord — Film Club #1: J-Horror
Banmei Takahashi directs the fuck out of what is a home-invasion horror film that is half vibes (thanks to the score), half visceral violence. Takahashi does a beautiful job of lulling us into a false sense of security and then slowly ratcheting up the uncomfortableness and tension as the film progresses. The villain, a shady salesman, relentlessly and obsessively torments Yasuko, a mother and wife, and once the door gets broken down, terror and chaos ensue. It's a simple story that is expertly executed, leaving me just as stressed as the first time I saw it. It is worth checking out on its own merits, but also because Door II: Tokyo Diary (Takahashi) and Door III (Kiyoshi Kurosawa) could not be any more different. If you're looking for solid underground horror flicks from Japan, prioritize this series!
Door is an unsettling home invasion film that taps into various urban fears: the apathy of neighbors, intrusive door-to-door salespeople, phone marketers, and even voyeurism. These themes all blend into a tense and chilling narrative, making it a hidden gem of the genre.
The film has some visually striking scenes, particularly during the intense chase sequences inside the house. One of the standout elements is the music—so catchy and haunting that it continues to play in your head long after the credits roll.
What’s fascinating is that Door was once considered a lost film, making its availability today all the more special. It’s definitely worth checking out for fans of home invasion thrillers and hidden horror gem.
🚪🚪🚪🚪🚪🚪🚪🚪🚪🚪🚪🚪🚪🚪🚪🚪🚪🚪
1st Banmei Takahashi
Collab with Irene!
The pressure cooker is about to explode somewhere in urban Japan. Something in that regimented world has turned a doorstepper of a salesman into a homicidal maniac, endlessly kicking a woman's door while clutching his bruised hand in a manner equally baffling and ferocious. Door's strange mixing of tones reaches its peak in a bizarre chainsaw riff on The Shining: Takahashi plays this out with no music. The result is a sparse symphony of metal on metal and metal on pasteboard, a weirdly rhythmic moment that cuts all tension but maximises the strangeness of this situation. Just how did we get to a man having a meat fork poked through his cheek? Or sperm tissues being put in the letterbox? We never quite know, despite the cause and effect nature of the plot. Somewhere a spring snapped, and all hell has broken loose.
Well, hi there you beautiful people.
After spending way too long curating my Hooptober list, I put this one. It almost made my list but ultimately was kicked and thus, I decided to watch it today.
A housewife lives in an urban high-rise apartment with her family where she has to experience the same horror we all do - spam calls and door-to-door salesmen (seriously, they still do that here.) - one day, she slams the door on a salesman's hand and that's when her true nightmare begins.
So, this sounds like a pretty basic home invasion film but it was executed quite interestingly. Takahashi Keiko plays the houswife, Yasuko, demure at the beginning who must overcome her fear to…
The tension is rising constantly in this low budget Japanese Stalker/Home Invasion Thriller. It’s almost uncomfortable at times. Direction, cinematography, music and performances are all strong. In short, a very effective little Thriller with a killer final act and a must watch for Japanese Genre fans. Out now on Blu-ray in the UK from Third Window Films as part of the Director's Company Edition. Along with its sequel, "Door 2" which I’m about to watch next.
A remnant of the 80s home invasion panic era and a hidden gem of a Japanese tradwife domestic terror. It's as if Good Housekeeping and Harlequin romance novels collaborated on a thriller for neglected homemakers and horny SAHMs.
That score of mainly on-hold music though...not sure if it cheapens or elevates it. It's mostly the same track over and over again.
Wait, this is taking a turn... Is it making good on rape fantasies or actually memory-repressive rape? Did that actually happen, or what happened?
Luckily this isn't Tetsuo and most sexual violence is off-screen, so no serious trigger warning needed. Also it may have been entirely in someone's head... His or hers, I dunno.
I'm just going to…
Unique Japanese thriller that leads you through a dreamy nightmare until it erupts into a slasher-drenched climax. Door seems to reside in this overlapping hell of existential dread and sinister sleaze as Yasuko contends with the unrelenting torment of a stalking salesman.
It all starts when he aggressively tries to give her a pamphlet by opening her chain-locked door. She slams it shut on his hand and the injury seems to untangle the villain out of his shell. Without a peep hole, she has no idea what he looks like, and he uses this to strategically taunt her life. Once he discovers what she looks like, the film then evolves into something claustrophobically perverted.
Yet there's that evocative synth and…
