Sakichi Sato to adapt George Asakura’s ‘Heibon Punch’

Here’s further proof that if you need to get a truly bizarre project done in Japan, Sakichi Sato is your man. George Asakura, who is actually a woman in spite of her mysterious pen name, has deemed Sato the only person capable of bringing her Ikki comics manga, Heibon Punch to life. The film version will star Sato and gravure idol Rina Akiyama in her first major movie role.

In the film Sato plays Aki Mashima, a fat 30-year-old indie movie director who gets robbed of his first opportunity to direct a commercially successful film by a rival director (Tasuku Emoto). Still reeling from his disappointment, Aki meets a young actress named Mika (Akiyama). Mika fits Aki’s ideal image of a female figure. In fact he not only has a preference for petite, small-breasted women—he’s actually repulsed by large breasts. Whenever he finds himself falling for Mika, he’s magically transformed into a good-looking man (Ryosei Konishi) by “the power of love”. Mika dreams of getting gigantic breast implants someday, and is attracted to Aki in his original fat form, but totally disgusted by him in his good-looking form. When Mika murders a rival idol the unlikely couple go on the run and Aki takes the opportunity to turn their adventure into a movie. While on the road they have to balance the bizarre back-and-forth nature of their relationship with working on the movie that could launch both their careers.

No word on a release date yet, but it should be sometime in 2008.

Source: Cinema Topics

 Subscribe in a reader

Tags: george asakura, rina akiyama, road movie, ryosei konishi, sakichi sato, show aikawa, tasuku emoto, yuuri morishita