City Hunter (2024) [Film Review]

City Hunter; or, Mr Private Eye
     I’ll take you on your case. Let’s go avenge your brother.
I’m back with new, belated update. This time, I take a look at another 2024 April release. To be specific, I really wanted to check out a Netflix live-action adaptation of the popular City Hunter franchise.

Release Info

Directed by: Yuichi Sato Starring: Ryohei Suzuki, Misato Morita, Asuka Hanamura, Fumino Kimura

Language: Japanese Original Title: シティーハンター Runtime: 102 min

Synopsis
Tokyo, 2024. Private detective Ryo Saeba (Ryohei Suzuki) is an excellent marksman, and also a pervert when it comes to relations with women. He is working on a case of a missing girl together with his friend Hideyuki Makimura (Masanobu Ando), who is an ex-cop. After the murder of Makimura, Saeba joins forces with his partner's sister, Kaori (Misato Morita) to discover the mystery behind a deadly drug known as Angel Dust.

Midnight Lighting
To be honest, my knowledge of City Hunter is limited only to the 1993 Hong Kong adaptation with Jackie Chan in the leading role, so please don’t hit me. I have no idea how it’s possible, but the City Hunter craze never caught me. I’m familiar with the premise of the show, but I don’t even think that the original anime and OVAs from Sunrise were broadcast in my country. The Korean and French adaptations from 2011 and 2019 respectively are also beyond me. As a result, I approach the 2024 film with the non-fan mindset.

The Netflix production directed by Yuichi Sato certainly caught my attention due to its stylish production design and over-the-top action set pieces. It is clear that this movie was made by the fans for the fans, so even though I am missing out on some vital easter eggs and plotlines from the manga, I still appreciate the fast pacing and interesting storyline.

Although the movie is set in present day, you can clearly feel the vibe of the 1980s. What is more, I love the neon lighting of many scenes and great attention to detail (city skyline is oftentimes prevalent throughout the movie). In addition, the end credits are a real design treat.

In my opinion, Ryohei Suzuki totally rocks as Ryo Saeba. I really like his overconfident on-screen behaviour, so it’s much easier for me to buy his interpretation of the character than Jackie Chan’s. However, the NSFW jokes crop up a bit too often, in my opinion. Because of these, at times, I had a feeling that I was watching yet another Naked Gun movie.

Additional praise goes to Misato Morita as Saeba’s sidekick, Kaori Makimura. Personally, I think she steals a lot of the scenes, especially the ones that involve drama and moments of vulnerability between the characters. I think that Morita had better material to work on than in the case of The Naked Director, and I certainly look forward to seeing her in more movies and dramas. That being said, Takaya Sakoda really scared me as the main villain. Indeed, he gave a menacing performance and at first, I thought I was looking at deaged Ken Mitsuishi from Ouroboros drama. There is certainly a similarity in the crazed look of both actors. I also liked seeing Asuka Hanamura and Fumino Kimura in supporting roles.

Recommendations
To sum up, I greatly enjoyed City Hunter from Netflix and I’m definitely open for a potential sequel. In the meantime, the movie encouraged me to check out the Sunrise anime, but I still have no desire to watch Korean and French productions.Overall score: 7/10

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JDM Restoration [News]

This week, I would like to bring to your attention a Youtube channel called JDM Restoration. On the basis of the name, you’d think that it focuses on automobiles, but its main purpose is actually restoration and preservation of film media centering around JDM.

     Interestingly, the person behind the channel has taken it upon themselves to restore the Shuto Kousoku Trial movie series, about which I wrote on my blog and on Kayo Kyoku Plus blog as well. You don’t need to look further, just scroll down this post, to see all the movies restored by this Youtuber.
     Needless to say, they did an amazing job, and it is even more surprising that they worked on the only available DVD sources out there. The subtitles are also hardcoded from scratch. If you wish to know all the technical details beyond the restoration of these gems, then head over to description boxes under the first video.
     All things considered, they are doing God's work. I wish there were more channels like that out there preserving forgotten movies.

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GTO Revival (2024) [Special Review]

GTO Revival; or, A New Lesson
     Even if you don’t have these, you are you. You’re the cutest.
I have to start this review with a big thank you to Rise from Phoenix Talks Pop Culture Japan because without her, I would have completely missed out on the info that FujiTV actually cooked up a GTO Revival special with Takashi Sorimachi returning to his legendary role(!) Indeed, we live in the age where heroes of the 80s and the 90s keep coming for one last hurrah, from Indiana Jones to Batman, but I have never imagined in my wildest dreams that this phenomenon would also impact the GTO franchise.

Release Info

Directed by: Yoshihiro Fukagawa Starring: Takashi Sorimachi, Sae Okazaki, Rikako Yagi

Language: Japanese Original Title: GTOリバイバル Runtime: 91 min

Synopsis
26 years after the start of his unconventional career, and teaching the first class of high schoolers, Eikichi Onizuka works as a… food delivery man. However, he is soon called in by one of his former students who works for the Ministry of Education. Onizuka is asked to investigate a private school which is plagued by an influencer personality known as Judge-or-Laugh. Onizuka steps into action to free students and teachers from cyber-terror.

The Age of Cyberbullying
Honestly, as soon as Takashi Sorimachi appeared together with obligatory cameos from original cast members of the drama, I had a big smile on my face. On top of that, when a remix of the Poison theme tune by Sorimachi and Blue Encount kicked in, it was pure icing on the cake.

That being said, this TV special is not a perfect revival of the drama that manages to capture the lighting in the bottle, and understandably so. It’s been a heck of a long time since we saw Sorimachi’s GTO on the screen, and this episode has a lot of catching up to do to reintroduce the character into modern age.

The main conflict of the story is very interesting because it concerns all the schools across the globe: cyberbullying. It’s very exhilarating and cathartic to see Onizuka’s take on the matter, but his approach is mostly recycled stuff you’ve already seen in the drama episodes and the theatrical movie: With his unconventional approach, Onizuka empowers the victims and makes baddies confront their inner trauma.

Unfortunately, getting to the gist of Onizuka’s modus operandi is repeatedly interrupted by the episodic and disjointed narrative of the TV special that throws lots of new characters and constant exposition at you within the span of 90 minutes. As a result, this episode feels like a pitch for a new GTO season crammed into a movie format. This, unfortunately, doesn’t work well.

With regard to performances, Takashi Sorimachi IS (and will always be) Great Teacher Onizuka. This man is literally “too cool for school”, even when he is 50 years old. I also enjoyed the performances by Rikako Yagi, Mei Hata, Kosuke Suzuki, and Yosuke Kubozuka. Apart from numerous easter-egg cameos, there’s one that particularly stole my heart at the very end of the special, but I refrain from any spoilers.

Recommendations
All things considered, I enjoyed GTO Revival more than the theatrical movie from 1999, but still it doesn’t achieve the level of the classic drama. It’s an okay story for a one-time revisitation of GTO. However, I wouldn’t like FujiTV treat this as a backdoor pilot for a potential continuation of the drama next year. My thanks go to Skeweds Translations for translating this special.Overall score: 7/10

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