GTO - The Movie

To be honest I did not have high hopes going in to GTO: The Movie. A live action adaptation of a relatively minor anime series shot for little money with a largely unknown cast I expected the quirky high school drama to be little more than fluff. But here's the thing: it is fluff, but it's very good fluff. With a story driven by eager reporters, serial criminals with police in hot pursuit, suicidal love struck teens, a sympathetic cow, and a former biker turned highly unorthodox high school teacher the film threatens to blow off in all sorts of different directions but thanks to some charismatic lead performances it stays remarkably grounded and becomes more than the sum of its parts.

GTO, short for Great Teacher Onizuka, is a story told in flash back by a youthful human issues reporter. Ten years earlier, desperate for the scoop that would make her carreer, our young reporter tracked a wallet she believes was dropped by a highly wanted criminal to a town in remote, rural Hokkaido. The town, once the site of a Canadian themed amusement park – a concept very amusing to this particular Canadian – has fallen on hard times and is filled with listless youth and out of work adults. Upon arrival she quickly discovers the just-arrived substitute high school teacher Onizuka, the owner of her discovered wallet who she assumes in the wanted criminal in disguise.

To say Onizuka is not like most teachers is an understatement. Young, impulsive and disrespectful of authority Onizuka seems more like a student than a teacher. He rolls into town on a motorcycle fresh out of gas and, seeing a pair of bullies working over a meek teen, he jumps in and robs the bullies of their cash himself so he can afford to put gas in his tank. Arriving at school to find a girl from his class threatening to jump from the roof ledge he jumps up with her – taking another student with him – and asks her to let the other student go first. See a fight brewing? Don't break it up, gather all the students together and start taking bets. Lessons? You never see him teach any. The kids want to walk out? Let ‘em go. But for all his quirks and general oddity it soon becomes clear that there is a method to Onizuka's madness and the lessons he's teaching have little to do with text books and everything to do with self empowerment and the true nature and value of friendship.

The core of the film is the three way relationship between Onizuka and two of his students, Raku and Ayano, both of whom he witnesses attempting suicide one his first day in town. Ayano is the friendless daughter of a local business magnate who effectively owns and runs everything in town. Seperated from her peers by her wealth and their relative poverty Ayano has given up on everything and everyone around her. Raku, the son of dairy farmers, is a quiet, meek, oft-bullied boy whose sole confidante is a young calf on his parent's farm and who is secretly and hopelessly in love with Ayano. Everyone seems trapped in their respective roles until Onizuka arrives and begins stirring the pot.

The film plays like an absurdly immature take on Dead Poet's Society with the anime roots fully evident. I kept thinking to myself that this really shouldn't work, that Onizuka should just be annoying, but strangely enough it all holds together. Why? First, although the direction is generally fairly flat it does capture just enough of the anime style to firmly establish that this is all happening in some alternate reality. The film establishes its own world quickly and stays within it, following its own peculiar logic throughout. Second, the lead performance of Onizuka treads the line between subtlety and camp without ever once slipping.

Make no mistakes, we're not talking about a classic here. We're not looking at serious social commentary or any other such thing. It is, however, a surprisingly good little film, far better than I expected and far better than it really has any right to be. Worth a look.