With the start of a new school term, there is no longer any sign of Noguchi, the bullied student who attempted suicide, and everything seems to have returned to normal. But stuttering substitute teacher Murauchi (Abe Hiroshi) gives a swift kick to this guise of normalcy by bringing Noguchi's desk back to the classroom, and stammering "good morning" to his empty chair everyday. His gesture becomes a pointed and painful daily reminder to both the school staff and his troubled students, especially guilt-ridden Shinichi (Hongo Kanata) who participated in the torment of Noguchi.
((summary taken from dramawiki, edited by me)) Hanazakari no Kimi Tachi E / ikimen paradise
Based on the popular manga of the same name by Nakajo Hisaya, Horikita plays the protagonist Ashiya Mizuki, a Japanese American living in the U.S. who one day sees the young athlete Sano Izumi (Oguri) compete in the high jump on television. She begins to idolize him, and after learning of his desire to give up the high jump, decides to move to Japan and attend the same school.
However, Izumi goes to an all-boys school, so Mizuki disguises herself as a boy to achieve her dream of being with her idol. But can she convince Sano to return to the track team? And how long can she possibly keep her gender a secret? And then, there's Nakatsu: the hot-blooded soccer player who finds himself strangely drawn to Mizuki, despite his penchant for liking women... what's a straight guy to do when he starts fearing he's falling for a man?
(This is the second adaptation of Hana Kimi: In 2007, Taiwan did their own version)
Lun (Jay Chou) lives with his father, Chiu (Anthony Wong), the music teacher of Tamkang Secondary School. Both of them are very good at music and piano. This is the first day Lun admitted to Tamkang Secondary School. When he walks through the campus with his classmates, a mysterious piano solo draws his attention. He follows the song and finds that an ethereal girl is playing piano in the old music room.
The piano girl is Yu (Guey Lun-Mei), one of Lun's classmates. She is always late for school and hence sits next to Lun at the back row. The two become intimate friends and spend a lot of time together. "What's the melody you played the first day we met?" asked Lun, "That's my secret." Yu whispered in his ear.
As the graduation day approaches, Yu decides to tell Lun her secret...
I recently discovered an anime (based on a shojo manga) that I instantly fell in love with called Lovely Complex. But since the series is currently airing, and is only up to episode 11, I needed something to ease the torture while waiting for new episodes. So, you can imagine how excited I was when I learned there was a live action movie made recently!!
So, as soon as I got caught up with the anime, I watched it.
And wow. At first I thought it was terrible...they add lots of unnecessary original stuff... and rather than focusing on the relationship from both perspectives, we're given Risa's angle and little else. The main thing that kept me watching was the awesomeness of Teppei Koike who played the role of Otani: he had the character down perfectly and did an excellent job bringing the character to life!! ^_^
The girl playing Risa, however...
Err, well, she certainly looked the part, and she was very cute.
Her performance on the other hand...
To be honest, it kind of annoyed me. For one thing, the way they had her over-acting drove me crazy. I realize that's probably the way the director wanted it... especially since there were certain scenes where the other characters mimicked the same kind of gestures. But still, it was distracting, looked bad, and was really unnecessary. It was like, with every line she delivered, she'd shake like crazy, and make weird motions with her hands. And her movements were over-exaggerated and looked staged--part of the reason though, is probably because they had her wearing high heels for a majority of the film. Which, by itself, didn't make much sense to start with. I mean, she's supposed to be at least a little self-conscious about her height, especially when standing next to Otani... and yet they have her wearing high heels to make her look even taller!
I just thought that was funny. Especially since being tall and being a good actress should have been the only requirements for Risa's actress... and yet, the girl they chose, didn't have either.
Throughout the entire movie, I just couldn't picture her as Risa--not like I could picture Otani. But that's just my personal take. I've heard of a LOT of people who loved her. And to be fair, her accent is adorable.
But still... was she the ONLY semi-tall girl in Osaka with an accent, or something?! Oh! And it was cool how they had Maity narrating... though I really wish they would have had him doing it in Japanese instead. His English really wasn't very good, and half the time, I couldn't understand what he was saying. If they really wanted to include an English speaking narrator, they should have at least chose someone who can speak it fluently. Why else include Japanese subtitles, when the language you're translating can't even be understood by native speakers?! Though I do like how they saved that "revelation" until the end. It was funny, on hindsight, that it was that crazy teacher speaking all along, lol.
I did NOT like that strange guy in the chair though--the one who kept popping up at random moments, to point out something really obvious or stupid. What was the purpose...?! Because it definitely wasn't funny.
And what was with Risa's sister?! That whole bit was annoying, disturbing, unnecessary, corny, and stupid. Instead of wasting time with made up story-lines and over-used jokes (their teacher's "wig" anyone?) they should have concentrated more on developing Risa and Otani's relationship. Or in the very least, developed Otani's side of the story a little more. We never got a good look into his head, so his revelations at the end practically came out of nowhere! I wish they had stuck more closely to the manga Maity-storyline instead. It wasn't quite as corny... and much more romantic.
Plus, the whole "height" issue which is the staple of the story, wasn't as powerful in the movie. She really wasn't that tall. In the anime, you can DEFINITELY see the difference between them in height--same goes for the manga--but in the movie, there really wasn't that much of a difference. Not enough to make such a big deal over anyway...
And (this is me, totally being nit-picky) but I really wish they would have had the kids wearing school uniforms like in the anime. Normally, I really wouldn't care, but the clothes they had the girls wearing (particularly Nobu, Risa's best friend) made them look like junior high delinquents pretending to be grown-ups--not high school students. It was so annoying! Plus, I didn't like how they tried to portray Nobu and Chiharu's relationships, into something dirty.
Prime examples: Chiharu blushing as she admits to her boyfriend that she's not wearing any panties underneath her kimono. And at the beginning of the movie, Risa's other friend, asking her bf to buy her something, and in exchange, she lets him do stuff to her body--
They sounded like lines out of really bad fanfics!
At least make it subtle!
Overall, it was a pretty average adaptation of a wonderfully, funny, cute, romantic story. They could have done so much better with the script and the casting though...
But again, Teppei Koike definitely held this movie together: in my mind he IS Otani. Of course, I'm in love with the japanese seiyuu for the anime too, so it could just be that I love his character period. Risa is one lucky imaginary girl, lol.
In the future, I have (and will) watch this again... simply because I have an unhealthy obsession with this couple, and need to see them in whichever form they happen to embody. If, however, you could care less about Lovely Complex (or most high-school oriented romantic comedies, for that matter) I'd suggest skipping this one all together. But for shoujo fans, you're sure to be entertained. Just ignore Risa's shaking, concentrate all your energy on Otani, and enjoy! ^_^
Dang. I didn't like this movie as much as I thought I would. My main problem, surpringly enough, was the main character: I never realized it before, but it looks like I prefer strong protagonists, over weak, passive resistent ones. Hyun Soo wasn't exactly weak in all honesty... but for a majority of this film, he was a giant pushover. It made most of the film uncomfortable to watch, and he made me want to bang my head against a wall many times.
I've also discovered that I'm not a huge fan of Han Ga In, the girl that plays Hyun Soo's love interest. I've seen her in Super Rookie, and in a drama I've been help sub, Doctor Kkaeng... something about her just rubs me the wrong way. Of course, the character she played in this movie didn't help her case at all: I couldn't stand the character, and didn't understand what Hyun Soo saw in her! Thankfully Kwon Sang Woo is an amazing actor, and he made watching the movie more than worthwhile. ^_^
As for story and pacing... it was good. I must admit though, that by half-way through the movie I was tired of watching, and just wanted the story to end. It had a very strong beginning, and if the main character had been an easier character for me to root for, I would have enjoyed it a lot more. I think it just overshadowed the rest of the movie, and made it hard for me to enjoy it to its full potential. With every twist, I just wanted to scream, or shake one of the characters. I loved Hamburger though. He was a great, fun character. And the depiction of the school was really brutal. I can't believe how horrible teachers were allowed to treat students back then! I really couldn't blame Hyun Soo for finally snapping. It's just too bad it came so late...
In the beginning, I thought Bruce Lee would have a much bigger impact on Hyun Soo... instead, his influence didn't have any impact until the last 10 minutes of the movie. The main character seemed more moved by music, and 'turning the other cheek', than fighting. And the fight scenes weren't even that great. I've seen some great fight scenes in movies, and these just paled in comparison to all of those. These were more realistic, with lots of flailing, and head butts to stomachs.
Overall, it was a powerful film, though the moral came off a little ambiguous to me. But for some reason, I just couldn't enjoy into this movie the way I wanted to...
Hina, a student at Nikko High School, goes out one evening with her classmate Beniko. They get split up and Hina ends up in a strange meeting with a man named Ikumi in a game arcade. The next day, Ikumi turns up as the new teacher at her school. Ikumi doesn't seem to recognize Hina but the wheels of fate are slowly moving to reunite them in what is a passionate story of forbidden love.
One of the main underlying themes of this drama is death. Another important theme is the struggle Hina and Ikumi have in trying to realize the difference between love and dependence... or is there a difference?
Not just a remake of the 1993 version; it takes place at the same school, but with different characters and situations.
Han-kyung a rustic girl, comes to town to live with her mom. Attracted to her pure charm, the most popular guys Hae-won and Tae-sung come up to fight each other. But Tae- sung has a fatal secret not to love her. Their sad love triangle makes everyone cry.
This movie is also known by the title, Romance of Their Own.
Having replied to a wicked post on her school website, Ye-won keeps getting a threatening call from a boy named Ji Eun-sung. Having heard about him from her friend, she keeps running away from him. But they kissed accidentally when Ye-won was trying to escape from him. Having his lips stolen by Ye-won, Eun-sung threatens her to marry him, adding that no other girl has ever kissed him before. The only thing Ye-won can do is to obey for whatever Eun-sung said. At first, Ye-won just hate him the most for his self-righteousness and unreasonableness. But she gradually finds herself is starting to fall for him…
Aoi Tori / The Blue Bird / 青い鳥
