The Pillow Book is written and directed by Peter Greenaway, and is loosely based
on a 10th century Japanese literary classic called The Pillow Book of
Sei Shonogan.
The movie follows the life of Nagiko, a woman who, growing up,
listens to her mother read The Pillow Book of Sei Shonagon and, every year, feels the
touch of her father writing a birthday greeting on her skin. Nagiko develops a love of
literature in both the traditional sense and in the touch of ink to skin. After a twisted life
in Japan involving an oaf of a husband and a homosexual publisher, she flees to Hong
Kong, where she confidently asks lover after lover to write all over her body.
Eventually, in her search for the ideal lover/calligrapher, Nagiko meets Jerome, an
English writer/translator. Though with horrible penmanship himself, he invites her to use
his body as the pages of a book all her
own. At first closed off to the idea, Nagiko becomes infatuated with
writing on others, and with Jerome. This gives the viewer visual feasts of the human body,
both naked and clothed with words.
Even more fascinating, if possible, than the
myriads of human flesh is the technological display. The Pillow Book is a movie with
layers, with frames within frames and windows on top of windows. Much of the movie is
set against a background of creamy text or erotic artwork, subtitles emerging and
vanishing through the scenes.
The Pillow Book stars Vivian Wu as Nagiko and Ewan
McGregor as Jerome. Other credits go to Yoshi Oida as the Publisher and Yutaka Honda
as Hoki. It was filmed in 1995 but released in 1996, and carries an NC-17 rating in
most countries, though it is unrated in the US. It contains Italian, Japanese, Mandarin,
Cantonese, and French; usually subtitled but often left to the original language and sound devices, and is narrated in English.