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Totto-Chan Director Will Introduce Film in London on November 17

The Scotland Loves Anime festival has confirmed in a press release that Shinnosuke Yakuwa, the director of Totto-Chan: The Little Girl at the Window, will make a personal appearance at a London Q&A, following a screening of the film; this will be at the Picturehouse Central cinema on Friday November 15 at 5.30 p.m.

Totto-Chan: The Little Girl at the Window is Shinei Animation's anime film of Tetsuko Kuroyanagi's Madoigwa no Totto-chan autobiographical memoir. The film opened in Japan on December 8. Kuroyanagi's memoir tells her story of going to school at Tomoe Gakuen, after not fitting at her original elementary school. She meets unique students and learns new things at school, even as Japan descends into war. Kuroyanagi published the book in Japan in 1981, where it became a bestseller over the next year. It became required reading for Japanese elementary school students in the 1980s, and was also translated in English and many other languages worldwide.

The festival has already confirmed the guests that will appear at the Scottish screenings of Scotland Loves Anime. Naoko Yamada, the director of A Silent Voice and Liz and the Blue Bird, will appear at the Glasgow screening of her new film The Colors Within on Saturday November 2 at 5.10 p.m. The venue will be the Glasgow Film Theatre.

CoMix Wave animator Maho Takagi will appear at a joint Edinburgh screening of a short film she directed, The Scent of Love ("Hatsukoi no Nioi"), together with Makoto Shinkai's Suzume. The screening will be on Friday November 8 at 5.45 p.m. at Edinburgh's Cameo Picturehouse. Takagi will also appear at the festival's Education Day, which also takes place on November 8; it is open to students and recent graduates of animation and related fields.