Konketsuji Riki (Movie)

By 1972, Toei had made two “Girl Boss Blues” films helmed by Norifumi Suzuki and it was decided that “Konketsuji Rika” would get a film adaptation produced by Kindai Eiga. Presumably there wasn’t a large selection of mixed-race actresses to fill the role of Rika, so “Weekly Myojo” ran an extensive casting competition for the lead. The victor in February 1972 would be Rika Aoki. Being Caucasian/Japanese mixed-race as well as an impressive 170cm tall, Rika Aoki would be a perfect choice to match the stature and looks of her manga counterpart. The casting was a big deal and almost immediately a soundtrack was recorded with Aoki herself singing. This would consist of 2 tracks- “Konketsuji Rika” (listed as the manga theme) as the A-side and “Rika, My Girl” (the film theme) as the B-side. It is clear that this was made to appeal to fans of the manga with Taro Bonten’s illustration taking precedent over Rika Aoki. Being able to rely on the manga artwork to sell the record shows how popular it had become by then.

Rika Aoki Weekly Myojo

Two months later to coincide with the upcoming film, the record was re-released this time with the tracks inverted so the film theme was the A-side and the sleeve art using photos from the film’s promotional shoot. “Konketsuji Rika” would finally be released in November 1972 by Toho to reasonable success. Whilst the film is a faithful adaptation of the manga, too little care is taken on fitting the story to the film medium. The film practically uses the manga as a storyboard which results in bizarre pacing. Whilst sudden location changes between chapters of the manga isn’t particularly noticeable; the film appears disjointed and frenetic, almost like transitionary scenes have been cut entirely. Unless the viewer was intimately familiar with the source material, they would have probably been confused for the first 20 minutes.