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Penguin Highway Anime Film Opens in April in U.S., Canada
posted on by Karen Ressler
Eleven Arts announced via an English-subtitled trailer on Tuesday that its United States screenings of Hiroyasu Ishida and Studio Colorido's Penguin Highway anime film will begin on April 12. Screenings will begin in Canada on April 19. The company's website has a list of theaters and dates.
Eleven Arts held the film's United States premiere at Crunchyroll Expo in September. The film opened in Japan on August 17 and ranked #10 in its opening weekend.
The story of the original novel by Tomihiko Morimi centers on fourth grader Aoyama (Kana Kita) and a mysterious older woman (Yū Aoi), who is a dental assistant and also Aoyama's first crush. When a group of penguins appears in his quiet suburban neighborhood, Aoyama works to uncover the reason for their appearance.
Hiroyasu Ishida, who directed Colorido's "Hinata no Aoshigure" and "Fumiko's Confession" shorts, directed the film as his first feature-length directorial work. Typhoon Noruda director Yōjirō Arai designed the characters for the film. Makoto Ueda, who wrote and supervised the scripts for anime adaptations of Morimi's The Tatami Galaxy and Night is Short, Walk On Girl novels, returned to pen the script for this film. Umitarō Abe composed the music.
The film won the "Axis: The Satoshi Kon Award for Excellence in Animation" award for Best Animated Feature at Montreal's Fantasia International Film Festival in July. The film has also been nominated for the Animated Theatrical Film Category of the VFX-Japan Awards.
Yen Press licensed Morimi's original novel.
Madhouse previously adapted Morimi's The Tatami Galaxy (Yojō-Han Shinwa Taikei) novel into a 2010 television anime under director Masaaki Yuasa. Yuasa returned to adapt Morimi's Night is Short, Walk On Girl (Yoru wa Mijikashi Arukeyo Otome) novel at his Science SARU studio, and the film premiered in April 2017 in Japan. P.A. Works adapted both of Morimi's The Eccentric Family (Uchōten Kazoku) novels into two television anime seasons in 2013 and 2017.
Source: Eleven Arts
