Summer Wars / Mamoru Hosoda @ Anime Festival Asia 2009
SUMMARY: Summer Wars (サマーウォーズ, Samā Wōzu?) is a 2009 anime science fiction film. The film focuses on a timid eleventh-grade math genius who has been falsely implicated in the hacking of a virtual world and, with the aid of a classmate's extensive family, must prevent the real and computer-simulated worlds from colliding. It was produced by the Japanese animation studio Madhouse and directed by Mamoru Hosoda [more via wiki].
The anime feature has since debut in Singapore cinemas from February 25th, but only exclusively via select Cathay theatres (why not in iHub Pasir Ris ~ WHY?). Check out more about the movie via it's official website at www.encorefilms.com/summerwars (includes synopsis and image gallery) or s-wars.jp (Japanese movie site), and CLICK THRU for a quick roundup of what director Mamoru Hosoda (who helmed "The Girl Who Lept Through Time", a fav of mine) had to say in his visit to Singapore, for Anime Festival Asia 2009! [tagged]
SNIPPET-SUMMARY of some points mentioned during Mamoru Hosoda's panel presentation at AFA'09 (Better late than never, yeh? heh), shown here along with snaps and images from the official movie website.
- Mixi.jp was used as an "inspiration" for this movie (as opposed to "facebook").
- A question was asked, of the Japanese people's perception of the internet, for which Mamoru-San mentioned that the Japanese do not show their true identities on Mixi, compared to Facebook.
- That was the reason why in OZ, the characters reveal their real names, in contrast to Mixi.
- Mamoru Hosda was humbled and surprised that many folks had watched GWLTT. He had since directed Superflat Monogram for LV + Murakami.
- He has started 10 years ago with "Digimon Adventure".
- "Simple and Sharp" was the directive for Summer Wars.
- Anime-inspiration that makes him want to do movies include; "Totoro", "Ghost In the Shell", amongst others.
Above shows a short "atmosphere snippet" of Mamoru-San mentioning the usage of Singapore's "Raffles Hotel" in the background of one of his movies "One Piece". Inspired (possibly) by a walk he had in a morning to Raffles Hotel.
- Mamoru-San mentioned the similarities of AFA had with Japan's "Big Sight" event/festival.
- 3 years went into the making of "Summer Wars": 1-year for planning and conceptualization, 1-year for scripting, and 1-year for the actual making of the film.
- The next movie after Summer Wars still not thought up, but it will be simple, in opposition to the complicated Summer Wars, closer to "Toketako".
PLOT-SUMMARY:
The story centers on high school student Kenji Koiso (Ryūnosuke Kamiki), a child prodigy in mathematics who spends his time immersed in OZ, a massive computer-simulated virtual reality world. Kenji is a genius with numbers but ill-adept socially. He secretly has a crush on his attractive upperclassman Natsuki Shinohara (Nanami Sakuraba) but does not have the courage to tell her. At the beginning of summer vacation, he is asked by Natsuki to help in celebrating her great-grandmother's 90th birthday. Although Kenji does not know the details of the plan, he agrees and goes with Natsuki to her grandmother's estate in Ueda, Nagano Prefecture. Much to Kenji's surprise, he is introduced at the Shinohara family house as Natsuki's fiancé.
As Kenji tries to act the part, meets Natsuki's dozens of relatives, and deals with the advances of computer expert Wabisuke Jinnouchi (Ayumu Saitō), Natsuki's uncle and "first love", he receives a mysterious e-mail with a mathematics code. He cracks the code and returns it to the sender but finds himself at the center of a developing news story the following day. Overnight, OZ has been hacked and turned into a digital deadzone, and he is the prime suspect. Using Kenji's account and avatar, the real "hacker", which is actually the advanced artificial intelligence system Love Machine, has stripped the virtual world empty and wreaks havoc in the real world. With car navigation systems disabled and computers malfunctioning, Japan grinds to a halt. Love Machine also gains control of a satellite and threatens to send it crashing to Earth. In order to fight back, Kenji enlists the help of Wabisuke, Natsuki's family, and his best friend using an army of avatars. With the fate of the world at stake, a great online summer war takes place. [All text via wiki]
[First 5 minutes / In Japanese language, no subs nor dubs]
