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Weathering With You Film Is Japan's 1st Anime Submitted for Oscar in International Category Since 1998
posted on by Jennifer Sherman
Japan submitted Makoto Shinkai's Weathering With You (Tenki no Ko) film for consideration in the Best International Feature Film category at the 92nd Academy Awards. The film is the first anime that Japan has submitted in the category since Hayao Miyazaki's Princess Mononoke in 1998. The award was known as Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film until this year.
Weathering With You has earned 10,073,344,500 yen (about US$94.59 million) by selling 7,519,350 tickets in 34 days, making it the #10 highest-earning Japanese films of all time. The last Japanese film to earn over 10 billion yen was Shinkai's previous film your name. three years ago. Weathering With You is also now the highest-grossing Japanese film so far this year.
The film opened on July 19 in Japan in 359 theaters and 448 screens. The film sold 1,159,020 tickets for 1,643,809,400 yen (about US$15.22 million) in its first three days, and ranked #1 in its opening weekend. The film earned 28.6% more in its first three days compared to Shinkai's previous your name. film, which earned 1,277,960,000 yen (about US$12.51 million at the time) in its first three days.
Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) will host the North American premiere of Weathering With You as part of its Special Presentations category. The film is eligible to win the Audience Award. The 44th TIFF will be held at theaters in Toronto, Ontario from September 5 to 15.
Shinkai confirmed that the film will get a worldwide release, and releases have already been decided for North America, Europe, Asia, and South America. GKIDS has licensed the film for North America, and will give the film an "awards qualifying" theatrical run this year before a wider screening with subtitles and an English dub in early 2020.
GKIDS describes the film:
The summer of his high school freshman year, Hodaka runs away from his remote island home to Tokyo, and quickly finds himself pushed to his financial and personal limits. The weather is unusually gloomy and rainy every day, as if to suggest his future. He lives his days in isolation, but finally finds work as a writer for a mysterious occult magazine. Then one day, Hodaka meets Hina on a busy street corner. This bright and strongwilled girl possesses a strange and wonderful ability: the power to stop the rain and clear the sky...
Shinkai is credited with the original work, and also directed and wrote the film's scripts for CoMix Wave Films. Masayoshi Tanaka (your name., anohana, The Anthem of the Heart) designed the characters, Atsushi Tamura (The Cat Returns, Mobile Suit Gundam: The Origin) was the animation director, and Hiroshi Takiguchi (The Garden of Words, Ajin) was the art director. Story Inc. is credited as producer, and TOHO distributes the film. RADWIMPS' Yōjirō Noda composed five vocal theme songs for the film, and the group also provided 27 background music songs for the film. Tōko Miura sang RADWIMPS' "Grand Escape (Movie edit) feat. Tōko Miura" and "Shukusai (Movie edit) feat. Tōko Miura" theme songs for the film.
Shinkai also penned a novel adaptation of the film that debuted digitally and in print on July 18. The film's soundtrack shipped on July 19. A manga adaptation by Watari Kubota launched in Kodansha's Afternoon magazine on July 25.
The 92nd annual Academy Awards will be held on February 9, 2020.
Source: The Hollywood Reporter (Gavin J. Blair)
