Nagiko (Vivian Wu), a Japanese born model living in Hong Kong, narrates this film. She wants a lover who can match her desire for sex with her love for poetry and calligraphy. The roots of this lie in her youth in Kyoto, when her father (Ken Ogata) would write characters of good fortune on her face. Nagiko's father celebrates her birthday retelling the Japanese creation myth and writing on her flesh in beautiful calligraphy, while her aunt (Hideko Yoshida) reads a list of "beautiful things" from Sei Shōnagon's "The Book of Observations". The aunt tells her that when she is 28 years old, the official book of observations will be 1000 years old, and that Nagiko will be the same age as Sei Shōnagon when she had written the book. Nagiko also learns around this time that her father is in love with his publisher Yaji-san (Yoshi Oida), who demands sexual favors from her father in exchange for publishing his work.
Frustrated by her inability to find a lover who is a good calligrapher, Nagiko finally meets a bi-sexual translator, Jerome (Ewan McGregor) who offers himself to her as a living surface for her erotic creativity. Inspired by the opportunity to obtain revenge on the publisher who blackmailed her father and is Jerome's lover, Nagiko creates the ultimate love poem illuminated in red, gold and black characters and delivered to the publisher on the naked body of Jerome. Eventually Jerome overdoses on pills and dies. After his funeral, the publisher exhumes Jerome's body and has Jerome's skin flayed and made into a grotesque pillow book of his own. Nagiko, now back in Japan, learns of the publisher's actions and becomes outraged. The publisher is confronted, hands the pillow book made of Jerome's skin to the messenger, then has the messenger slit his throat. Nagiko buries the book under a Bonsai tree and life goes on. She gives birth to Jerome's child (Hikari Abe), and is shown in the epilogue writing on her child's face, like her father used to do when she was young, and quoting from her own pillow book. It is Nagiko's 28th birthday.
This film, complete with a musical score as international as the languages used in the narration, is visually hypnotic and basically "art". There is nudity in the film, but it is very tastefully done and relevant to the plot. It's an exotic, difficult film but worth watching for lovers of unique movies. Peter Greenaway directed and wrote the script based on Sei Shōnagon's "The Pillow Book", the diary of a 10th-century lady-in-waiting.
