One of the great lost masterpieces of Japanese and adult animation, Belladonna of Sadness is a mad, swirling, psychedelic light-show of medieval tarot-card imagery, full of horned demons, haunted forests and gorgeous Gustav Klimt-influenced eroticism. 

The last film in the Animerama trilogy produced by the godfather of Japanese anime & manga, Osamu Tezuka and directed by his long-time collaborator Eiichi Yamamoto (Astro Boy and Kimba The White Lion), Belladonna unfolds as a series of spectacular still watercolor paintings that bleed and twist together. An innocent young woman, Jeanne (voiced by Aiko Nagayama) is violently assaulted by the local lord on her wedding night. To take revenge, she makes a pact with the Devil himself (voiced by Tatsuya Nakadai, from Akira Kurosawa’s Ran) who appears as an erotic sprite and transforms her into a black-robed vision of madness and desire. 

Fueled by a mind-blowing Japanese psych rock soundtrack by noted avant-garde jazz composer Masahiko Satoh, Belladonna is on par with Rene Laloux’s Fantastic Planet and Ralph Bakshi’s Wizards as an LSD-stoked 1970s head trip. The film has been restored using the original 35mm camera negative and sound elements – and includes over 8 minutes of surreal and explicit footage cut from the negative, marking a major rediscovery for animation fans.