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Live-Action Orange Film Starts Filming & Seeks Extras

The live-action film of Ichigo Takano's Orange manga has begun shooting in Nagano Prefecture's Matsumoto City on Tuesday, September 1. The staff of the film had announced that filming will take place until early October. Takano's original manga is set in Matsumoto City.

The film's staff also revealed a production still featuring the film's main cast in costume.

Tao Tsuchiya, who plays Naho Takamiya in the film, commented when filming began, "When I first sat on a chair next to Kento [Yamazaki], he was Kakeru, just as I'd imagined."

The film's official website also revealed that it was running a promotional event called "Kako to Mari no Shashinkan" (A Photo Studio of Past and Future), where participants can submit a past photo of themselves along with a current photo taken in the same place to match the past photo, as well as a message to their past selves.

The website is also accepting applicants to appear as extras in the film.

The official website previously streamed a teaser trailer for the film in August.

Text: A single letter came to me in spring of my second year of high school.
Narrator: What would you do if you learned the future of someone important to you?
Naho/Text: April 20, today I fell in love with Kakeru.
Naho/Text: May 21, I learned later that Kakeru was worrying about something around this time.
Naho/Text: December 31, I wish I could save Kakeru.
Naho: Now, 10 years later, Kakeru isn't here.
Text: A youth true love story that ties together "Present" and "Future"
Narrator: That letter is from your future self.
Narrator/Naho: Orange
Text: A letter from the future will change the fates of two people.

Seven Seas Entertainment will publish the original manga in North America, and it describes the manga's story:

Everyone has regrets in life. So who wouldn't take the chance to change the past if given the opportunity? When sixteen-year-old Takamiya Naho receives a mysterious letter, claiming to be from her twenty-seven-year-old self, her life is suddenly thrown into flux. The letter tells her that a new transfer student by the name of Naruse Kakeru will be joining her class, and to keep her eye on him. But why? Naho must decide what to make of the letter and its cryptic warning, and what it means not only for her future, but for Kakeru's as well.

Mitsujirō Hashimoto (Sprout) is directing the film after his Suzuki Sensei series received The Japan Commercial Broadcasters Association's top live-action series award, the Galaxy Awards, and other honors. Orange is his first feature film in the director's chair. Arisa Kaneko (Densha Otoko film, Helter Skelter) wrote the scripts, and Yoshihide Otomo (Amachan, live-action Boku wa Imōto ni Koi o Suru) composed the music.

The film will be completed by mid-November, and it will open throughout Japan on December 12.

The film's official website previously revealed the film's main cast:

Tao Tsuchiya (live action Rurouni Kenshin, Library Wars) as Naho Takamiya, the manga's shy protagonist who receives a letter from herself 10 years in the future.

Kento Yamazaki (Kyō, Koi o Hajimemasu, Death Note live-action series) as Kakeru Naruse, the lonely boy that Naho has a crush on, and who Naho must save.

Ryō Ryūsei (Zyūden Sentai Kyoryuger) as Haruto Suwa, the soccer player who has feelings for Naho even as he supports her relationship with Kakeru

Hirona Yamazaki (Takashi Miike's live-action As the Gods Will) as Takako Chino, the cool, big-sister-type classmate

Dōri Sakurada (The Prince of Tennis musicals' Ryōma) as Saku Hagita, the strange, geeky classmate

Kurumi Shimizu (The Kirishima Thing) as Azusa Murasaka, the moodmaker of the group

Takano (Yume Miru Taiyō) began the shōjo manga in Shueisha's Bessatsu Margaret magazine in 2012, but moved it to Futabasha's seinen magazine Monthly Action in 2013. Takano ended the manga in the October issue of Monthly Action on August 25. Futabasha published the fourth compiled volume of the manga on February 20 and will publish the fifth and final volume later. The series has more than 1.6 million copies in print. The manga series ranked at #5 in on Honya Club's Top 15 Recommended Manga by Bookstores list for 2015.

Crunchyroll publishes the manga in English digitally. Seven Seas plans to release the complete series in two omnibus volumes.

Source: Comic Natalie