The Cow, Overexplained

Most people wouldn't like to see a cow's head when they looked in a mirror but it could have worse implications than they imagine. They could be mixed up in 2022's Ushikubimura ("Cow Head Village", 牛首村). Combining folk horror with the fatalism of a Carnival of Souls/Final Destination kind of movie, Ushikubimura starts out strong thanks to some creative trick shots and the charisma of its nineteen year old, first time lead, Kōki. About thirty minutes in, though, the story sadly gets bogged down in exposition and character drama is too much neglected.

We start off with a little found footage-style cinema with a trio of giggly teenage YouTubers exploring an abandoned building. To make things extra scary, one of them is wearing a cow's head. Their video becomes infamous when the girl with the cow's head gets stuck in an elevator and dies when the cable snaps.

The film cuts to some time later and we meet Kanon (Kōki), a charming young woman with really long hair (it never becomes relevant, I just thought I'd mention it because it always looks fantastic). Her not-quite-boyfriend, Ren (萩原利久), shows her video of the incident because it turns out the girl with the cow's head happens to look exactly like Kanon, fabulous long hair and all.

While the mystery about this persists, the film is at its strongest as Kanon goes about her life glimpsing ghosts at every turn. There are a lot of shots using reflections in pools, windows, and mirrors to show something off. One shot nicely uses heat distortion. Of course, Kanon and Ren end up having to explore the strange building themselves.

Eventually, they wind up in the Cow's Head Village of the title and things go downhill. There are long explanations about a cow god and a hereditary condition involving twins and human sacrifice. It's a good premise but the film would've been better off allowing us to piece together the information through visuals than to have it explained to us. There are also too many scenes where we get a direct explanation for what a ghost is doing and why. The film starts to feel like an instruction manual. What's worse is that Kanon never gets much depth. If the movie is going to talk about family curses and blood ties, it ought to have given Kanon some personal drama she might start imagining is connected to the supernatural events. Like Fred Madison in Lost Highway or Detective Howe in The Wicker Man, I wished to see some kind of reflection of the horror in the personality of the protagonist. Sadly, Kanon, and her twin, Shion (also Koki), never amount to more than being just a pretty face. Or a pair of pretty faces. She does give a decent performance. I wish her better luck in her next role.

Ushikubimura is currently in theatres in Japan.