JOJO’S BIZARRE ADVENTURE: DIAMOND IS UNBREAKABLE

released 27 August 2017 | 15 | Dvd Director takashi miike Cast Kento Yamazaki, ryunosuke Kamiki, Yusuke Iseya, Jun Kunimura

Takashi Miike is Japan’s maddest director, infamous for Ichi The Killer and Audition. JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure is manga’s maddest saga, about a dynasty of huge-haired supermen. It’s a pity, then, that a film bringing them together feels so unexceptional.

Based on one of the manga’s mid-period storylines, the film’s set in a picturesque Japanese town where paranormal heavies turn a killer into a JoJo-style superman. Standing against them are a truculent teen scion of the JoJo family, an older JoJo who mentors him a bit, and a shrimpy schoolboy who stumbles into things. The fighters often manipulate elements like water, or objects like a toy-sized army. The effects are hardly cutting edge, but more damagingly, the fights rarely feel cinematically shot or scaled, and the film can’t capture the wackiness of its source material.

Perfectly watchable, the film avoids the pitfalls of live-action manga movies, and manages one empathisable presence (the boy’s gruff policeman grandfather). But it drags at two hours, especially during the later neverending battles and confrontations. No disgrace, but not nearly bizarre enough.

Extras Trailers. Andrew Osmond