‘xxxHolic’: Over-the-top camp casts a lackluster spell

Saying “I loved the cinematography” to a director about their new film is a classic insult, implying that the only thing to praise is the look since the substance is so lacking.

Photographer and director Mika Ninagawa not only invites this sort of snark about her films but positively revels in it. Beginning with her acclaimed feature debut, the 2007 period drama “Sakuran,” her offerings have been riots of visual excess, overwhelming the eye and mind. It’s easy to zone out from the sensory overload, like a dazed kid who has devoured a fruit cake.

Her latest, the fantasy “xxxHolic” (stylized as “xxxHOLiC” and pronounced “Holic”), is over the top in everything from its splendidly gaudy kimonos, which could have been sourced from the “Sakuran” storeroom, to its setting in a floridly imagined world of witches and evil spells that make the “Harry Potter” films look austere.

Based on a manga of the same title by the Clamp collective, the film promises campy fun, but becomes weighted down by its fortune cookie philosophizing. It’s as if Bill Murray’s obnoxious weatherman in “Groundhog Day,” from which “xxxHolic” takes obvious inspiration, were to respond to his absurd situation — stuck forever in the same day — with “what must be, must be.”

The hero is a high school boy, Kimihiro Watanuki (Ryunosuke Kamiki), who has a strange power: He can see ayakashi (vengeful spirits), which appear to him like dark, spidery clouds. Hating his fate, he is about to end it all when a colorful translucent butterfly lures him into a mysterious shop. The proprietor is a witch named Yuko (Ko Shibasaki), resplendent in a spangly headdress that makes her look like a silent movie star. “We grant wishes,” she tells him, “but at a price.”

His wish is to live an ordinary life and his price is to serve Yuko as cook and housekeeper. He also takes up residence at her shop, with its plants hanging everywhere like a jungle greenhouse and Yuko’s two sprite-like female assistants, Maru and Moro, who help Kimihiro with the household chores.

After his encounter with Yuko, two classmates, the macho Shizuka (Hokuto Matsumura) and bubbly Himawari (Tina Tamashiro), befriend Kimihiro and he begins to feel less lonely and that life might be worth living. All too soon, however, danger appears in the form of a slinky blonde witch, Jorogumo (Riho Yoshioka), and her menacing blond human lover, Akagumo (Hayato Isomura). They scheme against Kimihiro and his pals, for reasons that are unclear at first.

As a result of Jorogumo’s supernatural machinations, Kimihiro ends up repeating April 1 — his birthday — over and over. He embraces his new normal after realizing that by living in the same day, he escapes the hated ayakashi, but he soon comes to see it as a trap.

In the clash between the pure-hearted, passive Kimihiro and the born-bad Jorogumo, Yuko stands out for her sphinx-like ambiguity. Her power to grant wishes can do harm, but she is also Kimihiro’s ally and guide. This is a role Shibasaki, whose sharp-eyed, commanding side appears all too rarely in her films, was born to play. As Yuko she is regal and formidable, but leavened with touches of humor and hints of sly sexiness.

No wonder Kimihiro finds her hard to quit. In his mind, and mine, the “xxx” in “xxxHolic” is Yuko. And, for me, also her look, Theda Bara headdresses and all.