‘Gachi-ban’ ready to offer a ‘Crows’-inspired beat-down

Talk about coming out of nowhere. Today we present you with Gachi-ban, a movie that seems to have appeared out of thin air and yet already has a trailer and is primed for a limited 1-week showing starting July 19 at Cinemart Roppongi. Does this lack of prior PR mean it sucks? Quite possibly, but judging from the trailer it will at least give the kids some over-the-top delinquent schoolboy ass-kicking to tide them over until Crows Zero 2 comes out next year.

Created by long-time pinku director Hideo Jyoujyou and co-written by Masao Iketani (Yakuza’s Kindergarten), the film is pretty much a direct spoof that makes no effort to hide that fact that it’s trying to capitalize on the success of Takashi Miike‘s Crows Zero with a quickly-produced “high-tension yankee movie”. The difference, however, is that they’re replacing Miike with Jyoujyou and Shun Oguri with Shunsuke Kubozuka (Saikano, Yo-Yo Girl Cop). Something tells me they won’t be hitting the 2.4 billion yen mark that “Crows” reached.

Here’s a brief plot summary, as if it’s really needed:

Born-to-fight tough guy Takumi is part of a fearsome junior high school group of delinquents called “3 Crows” (!?) along with Furuta and Sawamura. After junior high each of the 3 go on to separate high schools and vow to eventually become the leader of their respective territories. Takumi takes the reigns of his school’s gang fairly quickly, but when a psychopath named Jojima comes back from a school suspension and amasses an impressive army of thugs with the intention of taking over the entire area all hell breaks loose.

The trailer, via YouTube. Hopefully it’s as funny as it seems:

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Tags: crows, delinquents, hiroko isayama, issei okihara, jiro sato, keisuke minami, naka akiyama, shunsuke kubozuka, sigeji maeda, yuuya matsuura