Back Street Girls: Gokudoruzu

I have watched maybe 3 episodes of the animated Manga upon which this movie was based upon, but I didn't actually know that they had made it into a live action movie. And initially, I wasn't overly fascinated with the Manga, so this movie wasn't one that was on my radar.

But I was given the chance in 2020 to sit down and watch the 2019 movie "Back Street Girls: Gokudoruzu". So I did that. However, I can't really claim that I was overly entertained by this live action movie of the Manga.

The acting in the movie was adequate, and yeah there were some funny moments here and there, but overall the movie was just too mundane and really was lacking majorly in the storyline and script department. Which made for a less than mediocre movie actually.

It was difficult for me to get into the atmosphere of this movie, as I just felt it was lacking vital parts that would otherwise have made it an interesting movie. Sure, I did manage to finish the movie, but I wasn't particularly enjoying the movie.

My rating of "Back Street Girls: Gokudoruzu" is a generous four out of ten stars. There was a lot of potential right there for the taking, but director Keinosuke Hara just didn't manage to do that.

The movie tells about three yakuza members that do something that really angers their boss, as punishment, they are sentenced to death. But as the three men ask for mercy, the boss decides for another kind of punishment and he says that the guys need to make a change in order to become an idol group and bring him lots of money or cut off a leg or spill their guts. And then they choose to become idols.

This premise sounded very interesting and kind of different but the movie just ignores all the development of that and jumps right to when they are fully transitioned into women already in a famous idol group. Aside from quick images nothing is shown about their transitioning process and they adapting into the new life and that is the big mistake made by this movie, it just ignores everything that could make this movie unique and more complex to only focus on a group of idols trying to get more success and fighting some yakuza along the way.

The highlight of the movie is the boss of the group, chief Inugane (Iwaki Koichi), he is funny and he likes to kick doors (literally) while the idols are fine but their male versions are a little over the top, they appear in some scenes later on as a clash of thoughts with their female versions and those moments were really unnecessary. The most annoying thing in this movie is the main villain that is super annoying and over the top. He is the CEO of an agency but looks like an angry teenager and behaves like a crying baby. The actor really didn't fit the role.

The movie length of only 1h27min shows how thin the plot is, instead of watching this movie I highly recommend watching the anime series with the same name avaliable on Netflix that is way more funny and has a more mature approach that makes a big difference while this movie is too constricted by its "PG13" approach.In the hands of Takashi Miike or Sion Sono this movie coud be way better. This is another example of an interesting premise with a very poor development.