Dare to Stop Us

The 1960s-70s marked the Golden Age of Wakamatsu Productions, founded by revolutionary auteur Wakamatsu Koji and staffed (for nearly free) with radical young artists like avant-garde filmmaker Adachi Masao, cinematographer Ito Hideo and scriptwriter Arai Haruhiko. Shiraishi Kazuya also cut his teeth making low-budget exploitation pictures at the company, and has directed this rambunctious, fact-based account of one young dreamer, Yoshizumi Megumi, who joins Wakamatsu in 1969 to make pinku eiga (softcore porn). As she struggles to fit into the testosterone-heavy “family,” and to find her own voice, Megumi’s life is equal parts heroic and tragic. (New York Asian Film Festival)