Love Com

I've only seen anime rendered as live action one other time, and that was an American film; "Speed Racer". Only "Speed Racer" was truly a piece of junk.

This film I just happened to grab for no rhyme or reason. It had an interesting cover, looked crazy, and so I thought it'd be some strange Japanese experience.

It delivered.

I really don't know what to say other than this is a film about a young girl falling in love, and done in a vein where every scene has some sprinkling of anime effect, and it's kooky to say the least.

There's lots of emotion, lots of ups and downs and just all around craziness. Not really a film I would recommend, but nor a film that I think is bad. It just is.

If you want something truly strange on your television, and have never seen anykind of anime (even the mainstream romantic genre aimed at young high school couples), then maybe grab a pizza and pop this in the player.

I don't have much more to add to that.

When dealing with manga-to-movie adaptations (or any adaptation for that matter), the director and his staff have to be very careful with the material that they have at their disposal. When all is said and done, and the film is released, the reaction to it can lead numerous paths. For instance, the film could be a disservice to the original fan base, displeasing hardcore fans alike. On the flip side, the film could also follow the route of being a faithful adaptation that could win over new fans as well as please the existing fans. "Love Com" is the rare case where the film is neither considered a "fan service" or "fan disservice", at least when I viewed it.

The film's storyline is the reiteration of the manga "Lovely Comlex". The main quirk of the manga is its two protagonists, Risa Koizumi and Atsushi Otani, who although with their considerable height differences, begin to fall for one another. In the film version, Risa is played by model Ema Fujisawa while Atsushi is played by singer and drama star Teppei Koike. The casting was a highlight for the film, with each of the lead roles, as well as the supporting cast, providing an accurate outwardly depiction of the manga cast. The use of vibrant colors throughout the film as well as the creative costume designs were also highlights of the film. Where the film falters though is the incredibly overreacting acting from the cast. Each character is so widely animated it gets to be a little irritating after awhile. I understand the use of facial expressions in order to express to the viewer what the character is going through, but the over abundant use just wears out over time. Combine this with a plot that is so thin, you can guess what happens next, and you got yourself a ticket to cinema clichéville.

Speaking of the cliché nature of the film, the film starts out promising enough, but then soon drivels into absurdity. For a film that harps so much on the height difference of its protagonists, it soon drops all that in favor for your standard trivial "boy and girl don't like each other at first, but then slowly begin to fall for one another" plot. In the end, the movie felt like one long Japanese television drama episode, which isn't a bad thing, but they could've done a lot more.

This is a quirky film, and you will probably have to be in the right mood to watch it. Not a film I would recommend to newcomers, (just stick to reading the manga first, then watch) but it's a film that should please some fans, but I imagine not all. Not entirely bad, "Love Com" does what it needs to do, and that is provide the laughs, which is one thing it does right.

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Maybe if you had never seen or heard about the anime/manga, you could have thought this was a film brought straight from the scratchpads of a screenwriter

Making this film stand out from the comic series is its greatest success. We can hear many negative reviews about this and I can imagine where they are coming from. Yet, the enthusiastic performance of the actors make this a good watch

The insane passion of the male lead and the off-beat, yet refreshing characterisation of the female lead makes the movie enjoyable.

There are many bland and mediocre shoujo adaptations but this is definitely one of the better and more entertaing ones. It's also definitely way more of a comedy than a romance. The story about a tall girl falling for a shorter guy and them denying their feelings for each other for the longest time because "it would be weird" makes for some great comedic breeding ground. The girl is very cute and her pouty face and her comic-like overacting in humorous scenes is hilarious. The guy is charming but a bit dense, he also has a lot of heart though. And then there are a few quite colorful side characters and many very crazy scenes that have so much humor in them. The whole movie has a little bit of this surreal, flamboyant, absurd Japanese game show vibe to it. I enjoyed every minute. Very recommended.

Love Com isn't just an adaptation of the manga and anime Lovely Complex, it's a transposition, and this makes a whole lot of difference. The director tried to give the film the feel of an anime, but what may work with drawn characters just looks plain silly with real people; the tone, the attitude, the gestures, all were exaggerated, very cartoonish and utterly unconvincing. It didn't look like a romantic comedy - which isn't a bad thing per se - but like a sitcom, with a colorful but lackluster production design and cinematography. For a film shot in 35mm meant to be released in theatres, that's totally off the mark.

The actors, who were in their early twenties, played their characters not as the teenagers they were supposed to be but as children. Otani for instance, the male character, wore a pink cap askew, long shirts and gestured like an adult impersonating a small child. That was passably ridiculous. The female lead, Ema Fujisawa, wasn't particularly impressive either, she made a lot of useless, silly faces, stupid motions, giving the same impression as Otani, that of a small child in an adult's body. I haven't seen the anime, but just from browsing pictures, it seems obvious they gave an immaturity to their characters that wasn't there in the first place in an attempt to create some light, happy atmosphere.

Ema Fujiwasa was cute in spite of her big ears, she had a nice face and her acting skill was superior to that of her male partner (she did cry well). In spite of my different grips against the film, it's mostly thanks to her that the film is watchable until the end. Another reason is that it gradually gets a bit better, perhaps because Otani character is a bit less childish than at the beginning, perhaps because we get used to the overacting. Some of the humorous side characters, the teacher and Kunimi Maitake, were on the better side of things too. However I could not shake off the feeling I was watching a Japanese sitcom and not a motion picture.

It's a pity because the main idea was good, it was about human prejudices, the embarrassment and obstacles both sex may have to overcome if a man is dating a taller woman, perhaps felt even stronger in a rigorous society like Japan. That may seem a trivial theme but there was definitely something worthwhile to explore there, I'm sure however the manga and the anime did it better. One thing though that I must give credit to the film was to make use of the excellent song from Puffy, Ai no Shirushi (been listening to it when writing this). Too bad the song wasn't more inspirational to the film crew !