Doushitemo Furetakunai is a great manga by my favorite BL author, Yoneda Kou. This movie faithfully reproduces the most serious parts of the manga. The dialogue comes straight from the manga, and the framing of shots is a very close copy of the visuals in the manga. Unfortunately, by copying the original, the director turns a visually beautiful manga into a static and dull film. Perhaps someone who hasn't read the manga as many times as I have will enjoy the artistic framing and angles. But I couldn't help wishing that the cinematography would be more dynamic, to capture just how dynamic the original manga artwork is. Film is a different medium than manga, and it needs different techniques.

A second disappointment for me was that the humor of the original work is completely missing from this adaptation. The original balances its angst with a wry, subtle sense of humor (which runs throughout even Yoneda Kou's most brutal works). The humor was, however, omitted here.

This is an example of how an adaptation can lose the spirit of the original by being overly faithful to the details. Some fans will like this faithfulness, but I found myself wishing I'd spent these 90 minutes rereading the book.