This one almost slipped under our radar. At the New York Anime Festival earlier this month, Bandai announced that they have the license for Mamoru Hosoda’s The Girl Who Leapt Through Time. Finally, the wait is over for this award winner! We have been covering this one for a long time and we’re happy to hear the news. The movie will have a limited theatrical release before a DVD comes out in 2008. The first screenings will likely be announced soon, and will probably take place in Los Angeles or New York. There may be a dub of the movie but it’s unknown who the cast is or if this will be the version shown in theaters. We will keep our eyes on the situation and let you know as soon as we find out! In the meantime though, check out this trailer!

Megumi Ogata Shares Her Love of Macs With Japan!

Broadband Watch is a website in Japan that caters to the technological crowd kind of like what CNET is to us. They are currently running a special where they are featuring 100 desktops of celebrities in Japan, and #38 comes from Megumi Ogata, who we all know as Sailor Uranus. Broadband Watch conducted an interview with her and here are the highlights! Megumi has been a loyal Mac user for 20 years, since the days of the Classic II (our older readers may remember those computers!). At home she uses the 17-inch model and she doesn’t change her desktop frequently (pictured here, with a censored sticky). She does use the stickies on her Mac a lot though, from writing simple memos, to reminding her of passwords for sites she likes to use. Her husband 20 years ago was a programmer and that’s how she got started on first the black and white Mac Classic II, and then moved on to the color model. Her first game was called Makigame and she played it when she wasn’t doing housework, and remembers a screensaver with a flying toaster. Her private office uses a Windows Machine but she is happy that she can use Word and Excel on her Mac. She hates Internet Explorer and Netscape, but uses Safari on her Mac, and her only gripe with it is that it deletes her browsing history quickly. She uses Microsoft Entourage along with a memory stick for her email, and she is currently learning how to use Garage Band. We would have expected Toru Furuya to give this kind of interview as he is often seen at many tech events, and never expected to see Megumi Ogata for something like this! It’s an interesting read, and fnas should definitely go check it out. She also likes to blog, and fans can read her blog here.

Mitsuishi Kotono Narrates Commercial for Popular Tour

We found a tiny mention of Mitsuishi Kotono (Sailor Moon) with regards to a tour. Mitsuhiro Oikawa is a current heartthrob in Japan, having appeared in many dramas and live action movies. Starting in December, he is going to tour Japan singing on his very own tour, Ichaicha: Cherie, Tu Es Moi (Honey, You Have Me). Kotono Mitsuishi is doing the narration for the TV spots advertising the tour, and she is also impressed by Mitsuhiro. The article also mentions that many of his fans call him “Chest-Kun” because he is often shirtless.

Paprika Wins Another Award!

In 1996, the Animation Kobe awards were created for the promotion of anime and other Japanese visual media. This year marked the 12th anniversary of the awards, and critically acclaimed director Satoshi Kon has another reason to smile as Paprika won the Feature Film Award! The interesting thing is that last year’s winner(Mamoru Hosoda’s The Girl Who Lept Through Time), was released just a few months ahead of Paprika, but both of these exceptional films were able to win this award because of a technicality in the rules. The Girl Who Lept Through Time was released in July of 2006, and Paprika that November. August was the cutoff date for the 2006 awards. This is Satoshi Kon’s second win in this category, his film Millennium Actress won the same award in 2003. On November 12th, there will be an event showcasing the works of all the winners in Kobe, and other winners this year included one of Moon Chase’s favorite directors, Isao Takahata, and one of this years hottest OVAs, Ghost in the Shell: S.A.C. Solid State Society.

Paprika will be coming out on DVD November 27th, so only a month and a bit before all our readers can finally see this film! On a side note, we’d really like to thank Mongrel Media for the terrible job they have done with the distribution of this movie in Canada. The movie spent most of it’s summer run in a single theater in Toronto, and is now being shown for barely a few nights in theaters all over the country. Considering how popular this movie was among the critics and how it was hailed to be a hit, unfortunately the distributor thought it would be better to let the movie sit for a long time in one theater and skip across the country. Even Ghibli films don’t get this kind of treatment. We know of several fans all over who were waiting in anticipation to see this movie on the big screen and have heard too many stories of disappointment, and that the United States did not experience these kinds of problems in most states.

Glass Rabbit Is Up For Grabs!

During the beginning of November, the American Film Market(AFM) is set to take place in Santa Monica, California. We told you not too long ago about The Glass Rabbit, which is currently making it’s way through Canada through special features from the Japanese Consulate. The Glass Rabbit is now going to be included as part of the AFM, where companies showcase films in the hopes that they will be picked up for production and/or distribution. We’re really hoping that it gets picked up – this movie did remind me a lot of the epicGrave of the Fireflies and it does hold potential to be a hit of close to that magnitude. We have since learned that this heartbreaking film is actually based on the real story of the author Toshiko Takagi. All of the performances were very good in this movie – especially of the young girl who played Toshiko, Rina Mogami. Taeko Kawata (Momoko Momohara) played the innocent role of Mitsuko, one of the younger sisters of the main characters. It was an exceptional film and we recommend fans go see this one if they can!

This film is making it’s way across Eastern Canada, and we recommend fans keep checking these links below for information when these films will be playing near them. Side Note: They were all good, but Hotel Hibiscus was a little mediocre.

For Ottawa, click here.

For Toronto, click here or here.

For Montreal, click here.

It was only a few days ago that we mentioned Mamoru Hosoda’s recent hit, Toki wo Kakeru Shoujo (The Girl who Leapt Through Time) that was quietly getting a lot of buzz all over the world. Mamoru sure has come a very long way from being a key animator on the SuperS Movie! The 2007 Annecy International Animated Film Festival was held from June 11-16 in Annecy, France. For 6 days, the world’s best picks in animated features, shorts, TV and internet features, and student films were shown in and out of competition. The film won Mention Spéciale (Special Distinction or Honorable Mention) in the Feature Films category, to our surprise beating Paprika! 30 animated works were selected from Asia, and out of all of those , Toki wo Kakeru Shojo was the only one to win a prize! This is a huge accomplishment and we congratulate Mamoru Hosoda as well as the cast and crew on their win!

Hey Moonies! Two movies featuring people related to Sailor Moon have been garnering a lot of buzz lately!

Paprika Opens Finally in North America!

Today is a big day for Satoshi Kon’s Paprika in North America! Today the film is opening in several cities across North America, including for the first time ever, Canada! There are three stars in this movie who previously worked on Sailor Moon : Megumi Hayashibara (Himeko Nayatake in the S movie) , Toru Furuya (Tuxedo Kamen) , and Daisuke Sakaguchi (The Dummy in the SuperS special Haruka Michiru Futatabi! Bourei Ningyougeki.). Once again we’ll remind fans that this is the subtitled version that has been released. No word as of this writing whether or not the movie will be dubbed in English.

If you are in the United States and want to check out your local movie listings for this film, click here!

If you are in Canada and want to check out your local movie listings for this film, click here!

If your cinema of choice is not listed in here, if you are in the United States tell the cinema’s management to contact Sony Pictures Classics or in Canada to contact Mongrel Media.

The Girl Who Conquered Time Hailed as Masterpiece!

While Studio Ghibli is noted all over the world for being masters of Japanese Animation, other, lesser known, films are comparable. One film that has been quietly garnering attention all over the world for the last year is Toki wo Kakeru Shoujo (Translation: The Girl Who Conquered Time or The Girl who Leaped Through Time depending on where you look). The film tells the story of Makoto Konno, a 17 year old girl who gains the power to go back in time in her sleep, after a train accident. While at first, she is impressed and indulges in her new ability, she soon realizes that altering the past alters the future, and things are not as simple as they seem. While the movie did not do well in Japan, it has fared well in festivals all over the world, won some awards, and is set to open in South Korea very soon. The movie is directed by Mamoru Hosoda, who was a key animator with the SuperS Movie. We encourage fans if they see this film pop up in a listing near them to definitely go see it!