Black Rose Mansion (1969) Rating: Starring: Akihiko Maruyama, Eitaro Ozawa, Takahiro Tamura Director: Kinji Fukasaku Category: Avant Garde, Foreign Studio: Ventura Subtitles: English Length: 90 mins     From the director of Battle Royale and Black Lizard Famous female impersonator/singer Akihiro Maruyama, fresh from success in Kinji Fukasaku's baroquely psychedelic Black Lizard, returns in this feverishly perverse, campy follow-up. Wealthy Kyohei (Eitaro Ozawa-A Taxing Woman, the H-Man) installs songbird Black Rose (Maruyama) in his elegant private men's club to bolster business-but Kyohei gets more than he bargained for when she attracts scores of homicidal past lovers, and not only he but his ne'er-do-well son (Masakazu Tamura) end up falling for the femme fatale. Kinji Fukasaku is one of Japan's most prolific filmmakers, having directed 61 films during his successful career. In the West, he is best known for directing the Japanese sequences (with Toshia Masuda) in Tora, Tora, Tora (1970), but to fans of Japanese cinema his fame comes from the bizarre cult films that he directed. One of his best films is the wild caper film Black Lizard (1968), which spawned the sequel Black Rose Mansion. He followed Black Rose with the rarely-seen coming of age drama, If You Were Young: Rage and Tora, Tora, Tora in 1970. Fukasaku has worked in many genres over his career, but became best known for his yakuza films including the five-part series, Fight Without Honor and Humanity and Blackmail Is My Life. He worked successfully in the science fiction genre with the Star Wars knockoff Message From Space, Virus and the U.S./Japanese co-production the Green Slime. He later directed some lavish samurai spectacles starring Sonny "the Street Fighter" Chiba, including Samurai Battle Royale, and ultraviolent, futuristic take on Lord Of the Flies met with controversy for its excessive brutality. The film has never been released in the United States because of its controversial subject matter. At the tender age of 72, Fukasaku is directing the sequel to Battle Royale against his doctor's suggestion that he retire.