Yudai Yamaguchi to helm “Elite Yankee Saburo” feature film

by Chris MaGee

News from Tokyograph today that the manga-based TV series “Elite Yankee Saburo” will be hitting the big screen with the help of director Yudai Yamaguchi. “Elite Yankee Saburo” was created by Shuji Abe and was originally serialized in Kodansha’s Yong Magazine before being turned into a live-action TV series in April of 2007 on TV Tokyo. The show follows Ōkochi Saburo, played by Ishiguro Hideo, a mild-mannered, nerdy teen who has a hell of a lot to live up to when he enrolls at Tokumaru Academy. It turns out that Saburo’s two older brothers were legendary delinquents at the high school, so when Ōkochi shows up the students and staff brand him a dangerous “elite yankee”. Ishiguro Hideo and the rest of the series cast are set to resume their roles in the feature film and apparently “Dead or Alive” star Riki Takeuchi will make a special guest appearance.

I’m kind of split on having Yudai Yamaguchi direct this one. On one hand I’m a huge fan of his comedies “Battlefield Baseball” and “Cromartie High: The Movie”. We know he can pull off a laugh-out-loud high school comedy, a kind of film we haven’t seen from him since his shift to horror films with 2005’s “Meatball Machine”. At the same time, though, “Elite Yankee Saburo” looks a little bit too much like “Cromartie High” (well, except for the frequent nudity of the TV series). It almost makes me wish that Yamaguchi would do a full return to comedy, but with a different kind of schtick than the crazy high schoolers. I guess we’ll have to wait to see the end result next spring when the film is slated for release.