Yasuharu Hasebe's "Aibou" spin-off looks bad, really bad

by Chris MaGee

Back in early July I was excited as hell to hear the news that veteran filmmaker Yasuharu Hasebe was going to return to the director's chair. Granted it was going to be for a spin-off film of one of 2008's biggest blockbusters, the big screen version of the successful TV Asahi cop show "Aibou (Partners)", but still. Now the trailer for "Kanshiki: Yonezawa Mamoru no Jikenbo (The Case Files of Mamoru Yonezawa)" has popped up online... and it looks bad, and I'm not talking a good sort of bad like Hasebe's famously campy 1966 film "Black Tight Killers" either.

"Kanshiki" centers around "Aibou" character Mamoru Yonezawa (Seiji Rokkaku), the show's forensics expert as he goes about collecting hairs and trace evidence to solve big cases, but with his bowl haircut, thick glasses and goofy buck teeth I'm damned if this guy couldn't join the Hall of Stereotypical Asians along with Mr. Moto, Mr. Yunioshi from "Breakfast at Tiffany's" and Toshiro from "Revenge of the Nerds" ("Hair pie...!" Remember him?)

Well, maybe I was expecting way to much from a spin-off movie, but... just head over to Nippon Cinema and watch the trailer to see what I mean.