The live-action adaptation of Teasing Master Takagi-san, Teasing Master Takagi-san Movie (映画『からかい上手の高木さん』), opens in Japan today, with a stage event featuring the cast that was live-streamed to cinemas across Japan. A typhoon was passing by this area today, so I was a bit uncertain if I could actually get to the cinema, but the typhoon passed earlier than expected and I didn't have to brave the wind and rain to catch the movie.
The stage event took place after the screening of the movie, and featured Nagano Mei who played Takagi-san, and Takahashi Fumiya who played Nishikata, as well as Eguchi Yosuke as Tanabe-sensei, and Shiratori Tamaki who played Ozeki Miki and Saito Jun who played Machida Ryo (these two are new characters for the movie). Director Imaizumi Rikiya also joined them on the stage.
You can find a video of the stage event on YouTube too.
I had been a bit apprehensive about this movie, after the disaster that was the live-action adaptation of Whisper of the Heart (my review here, plus additional thoughts here) which also had a "10 years later" story. I can proudly say that those fears were unfounded. Somehow, director Imaizumi managed to come up with a story that maintains the relationship between Takagi-san and Nishikata, while allowing them to each grow up mentally (and not just physically) in a story set 10 years after their days in junior high school.
This is no small feat. Nishikata has grown up to become a PE teacher at his alma mater, but he still retains his awkward personality, which makes it believable that he still behaves in a similar way around Takagi-san. Takagi-san, already more mature in the first place, continues to use that maturity to tease Nishikata, but also hoping to take their relationship to the next step now that they have both grown up. The relationship between the two of them is familiar to fans of the series, but they both showed aspects have having grown over the past 10 years, and the story even had episodes that showed that they have clearly grown.
It is a 119-minute movie, and the story itself can be a bit slow. However, I think this slow pace was to slowly build up the story, because in the end, I found myself shedding tears as the emotions struck me toward the end of the movie. I mean, I wasn't expecting to cry in this movie, but I was actually moved to tears. I would really recommend this live-action adaptation to fans of the series, after they have watched the live-action TV drama series, as a conclusion to the live-action route. The movie even ended with a scene referencing the spin-off series Teasing Master (Former) Takagi-san.
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