Despite the fact that it has never received anything approaching critical acclaim and hasn't scored at the box office in many years, the Highlander franchise has proved almost as durable as its immortal heroes. In the 21 years since the release of Russell Mulcahy's original film, we've seen four more features, two live-action TV series (one of which lasted for several years) and a short-lived animated TV show. The idea of an animated feature film is therefore perhaps not as surprising as it might seem at first glance -- after all, both The Matrix (1999) and Hellboy (2004) have been followed by animated spin-offs. However, Highlander: The Search for Vengeance is not just animated, it's anime, produced by the prestigious Madhouse, whose other works include Satoshi Kon's exceptional Perfect Blue (1997).

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Savage Harvest (1995) was an early shot-on-video gorefest by Eric Stanze, the talented filmmaker and head of Wicked Pixel Cinema who would later secure his reputation in underground horror with fierce, disturbing shockers like Ice from the Sun and Scrapbook. In many ways, Savage Harvest was your typical demonic-possession romp with a cast of doomed teenagers -- The Evil Dead, only steeped in Cherokee mythos -- but Stanze's considerable passion behind the camera made all the flesh-eating, throat-ripping, chainsaw-roaring carnage seem fresh and exciting. The sequel, written and directed by first-time feature filmmaker Jason Christ, builds upon Stanze's movie while establishing its own voice.

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Beyond-indie moviemakers have always had a special place in their hearts for author H.P. Lovecraft. His cult appeal has never quite grabbed the mainstream, and the existential horrors he wrote about just don't fit in at the multiplex. But down in the bowels of cinemadom, where things are a little funkier, his vision has taken root. This is a place where Brian Yuzna represents the pinnacle of budgetary decadence -- a strange and eclectic niche that nonetheless has a loyal core of adherents. Here, fandom and filmmaking merge into one, as enthusiastic Lovecraft followers try their hand at emulating the author's work.

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After two mediocre installments, Infection and Premonition (both 2004), the J-Horror Theater series finally manages to raise the standards a little with Takashi Shimizu's Reincarnation. Unlike Marebito (2004), the director's last Japanese-language film, it's a big-budget commercial picture that stays close to the niche Shimizu has created with the Ju-On/The Grudge series, something that has lead critics to herald it as further evidence of the decline of Japanese horror.

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Thanks to the offbeat serial-killer movie Cure (1997) and nerve-shredding ghost story Pulse (2001), Kiyoshi Kurosawa is recognized as one of Japan's premier exponents of the fear film. His long association with horror began in 1989, with Sweet Home, a big-budget haunted-house film inspired by The Haunting (1963) and Tobe Hooper's Poltergeist (1982). The pulsing soundtrack and eye-catching special effects are a long way from the subtle, metaphysical terrors of his later works, but it's still a superior horror film that deserves a wider audience.

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Frequently described as the king of horror manga, Hideshi Hino has been creating his own brand of graphic horror for nearly three decades now. Given the success of the many Junji Ito adaptations, it's perhaps surprising that there have been no attempts to translate Hino's stories to the big or small screen, although Hino himself directed two installments in the notorious Guinea Pig series (Flowers of Flesh and Blood and Mermaid in a Manhole). Both films showcased his talent for grotesque stories and over-the-top gore.

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Kazuo Komizu's notorious sex-splatter film Entrails of a Virgin is one of the early classics of modern Japanese horror and heavily influenced by Friday the 13th (1979) and American slasher movies. It is fitting then that a sequel, Entrails of a Beautiful Woman (Bijo no harawata), appeared soon afterwards. Rather than going over the same territory, Komizu took the rape-revenge movie as his template. The rape-revenge subgenre, embodied in the West by films like Wes Craven's Last House on the Left (1972) and the notorious I Spit on Your Grave (1978), is characterized by (predictably enough) prolonged rape scenes followed by equally protracted scenes of the heroine brutalizing and murdering her former tormentors.

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Outside of the notorious Guinea Pig series, few Japanese horror films have managed to provoke quite as much revulsion as Entrails of a Virgin (Shojo no harawata) and Entrails of a Beautiful Woman (Bijo no harawata). Both released in 1986 and directed by one of the leading figures of the mid-'80s wave of Japanese sex-and-horror movies, Kazuo Komizu (also known as "Gaira," a pseudonym taken from one of Toho's less successful giant-monster flicks).

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Almost three years before Hollywood released their remake of Hideo Nakata's smash hit Ringu, this South Korean version appeared and became one of the biggest box-office hits of the year. The four-decade ban on Japanese films receiving a general release in South Korea began to be lifted in October 1998, but in the first two years afterwards only six Japanese films were released. This Korean-Japanese co-production (one of the first between the two nations) provided Korean audiences with a readily available version of the biggest success story to come out of the Asian horror scene in half a century.

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Like Sogo Ishii's Angel Dust (1994) and Kiyoshi Kurosawa's acclaimed Cure (1997), The Suicide Manual examines the rising tide of violence in Japanese society, specifically the wave of teenage suicides. However, the similarities end there. While the former efforts are singular artistic statements that make few concessions towards filmmaking fashions, The Suicide Manual is a clear attempt to cash in on the success of Wataru Tsurumi's controversial nonfiction book of the same name, as well as Sion Sono's chaotic but memorable festival hit Suicide Club (2002).

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