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Ghibli's The Wind Rises, Yoshiura's Patema Inverted Vie For APSA Award
posted on by Lynzee Loveridge
Australia's seventh annual Asia Pacific Screen Awards announced its nominees for the December 12 ceremony on Tuesday. Hayao Miyazaki's 11th and final film The Wind Rises and Yasuhiro Yoshiura's (Time of Eve, Pale Cocoon) Patema Inverted (Sakasama no Patema) film are nominated for the Best Animated Feature Film category.
The Wind Rises centers on Jirō Horikoshi (played by Evangelion director Hideaki Anno), the designer of Japan's famed Mitsubishi A6M Zero fighter plane of World War II. Disney will release the film in North America, and Studio Ghibli International produced the English-language dub with producer Frank Marshall (From Up On Poppy Hill, The Secret World of Arrietty, Ponyo). The film opened in New York and Los Angeles last week, and it will open across the United States in February. The film was submitted for the Animated Feature Film category for the 86th Academy Awards, and has made the shortlist for the Best Foreign Language Film category of the 71st Golden Globe Awards.
Patema Inverted takes place in an underground world where tunnels extend everywhere. Even though they live in dark and confined spaces, people wear protective clothes and lead quiet and enjoyable lives. Patema, a princess in her underground village, loves to explore the tunnels. Her favorite place is a "danger zone" that her village prohibits people from entering. Even though she's scolded, Patema's curiosity can't be held back. No one ever explained what the supposed danger was. On her usual trip to the "danger zone," Patema faces unexpected events. When hidden secrets come to light, the story begins to unfold.
Patema Inverted competed and won both the Judge's Award and Audience Award at Edinburgh's Scotland Loves Animation festival last month. It premiered at France's Annecy animation festival in June and opened in Japan on Saturday.
The two films will compete against Cho Young-kag's Sa-i-bi (The Fake, Republic of Korea); Sergey Selyanov, Leonid Yarmolnik, Yuri Kushnerev, Oleg Urushev, and Konstantin Ernst's Koo! Kin-Dza-Dza (Russia); and the Children's Film Society, India's Goopi Gawaiya Bagha Bajaiya (The World of Goopi and Bagha).
Hirokazu Kore-eda's Soshite Chichi ni Naru (Like Father, Like Son) film is also nominated for Best Feature Film and Achievement in Directing; and Yasuhiro Masaoka, Hiroshi Higa, and Takeshi Sawa's Tabidachi no Shima Uta – Jugo no Haru (Leaving on the 15th Spring) is nominated for Best Children's Feature Film. Additionally, Tatsuya Nakadai is nominated for Best Performance by an Actor for Nippon no Higeki (Japan's Tragedy).
Hiroyuki Okiura's A Letter to Momo won Best Animated Feature in 2012, and Makoto Shinkai's 5 Centimeters Per Second (Byosoku 5 Centimeters) won the award in 2007.
