Bi bappu haisukuru

Nasu Hiroyuki's "Be-Bop High School" won't win any awards for acting or drama but is a fun movie with a lot of charm. Based on Kiyuchi Kazuhiro's popular manga series which ran in "Weekly Young Jump" from 1983, the story revolved around the lives of two rough-and-tumble High School friends Kato Hiroshi and Nakama Toru who seemed to make a habit of getting into trouble and starting up fights. In keeping with the spirit of the manga Shimizu Kojiro (Hiroshi) and Nakamura Toru (Toru) sported slicked back 50's style perms and adopted exaggerated swaggers that made them comical and yet also oddly cool. The movie featured also featured an assortment of outlandish characters who sported even weirder fashions and hairdos. The thing that most set the movie apart from others was its violent, brutal and drawn out fist fights between the characters. Think "Fight Club" meets "The Breakfast Club". While some of the violence was definitely over-the-top it did get sometimes brutal. "Be-Bop High School" marked the debut of 80's Pop Idol Nakayama Mihou and also helped to launch her TV/Movie career. While this first movie helped to establish the main characters it wasn't until the second movie, that things got a bit better story-wise. "Be-Bop Highschool" is definitely not your typical teen drama/comedy.