‘In This Corner of The World’ Director’s Message for Fourth Anniversary
In This Corner of the World (Kono Sekai no Katasumi Ni) was released on November 12, 2016. It has been four years since, and the director of the movie, Sunao Katabuchi, posted a series of tweets to commemorate the fourth anniversary of its release:
“Today is the fourth anniversary of the release of the film In This Corner of The World. I have received many tweets and I’m looking back on the various pages that I have spent a long, long time with this film. Since the release four years ago, so many people have been able to encounter this film. Thank you for your continued support.”
映画『#この世界の片隅に』公開4周年の今日。
たくさんのツィートをいただいて、長い長い時間をこの映画とともに過ごしてきた、その様々なページを振り返っています。
4年前の公開以来、ほんとうにたくさんの皆様にこの映画と出会っていただくことができました。
これからもよろしくお願いいたします。— 片渕須直 (@katabuchi_sunao) November 11, 2020
“It makes me even happier to find that many in those tweets say that this film has made the joy of watching a movie in a theater seat their own. I’m grateful for that.”
『#この世界の片隅に』4周年。
たくさんのツィートの中に、この映画をきっかけに、映画館の座席で映画を見る楽しさを自分のものにした、という声が多くあって、いっそう嬉しい気持ちになります。ありがたいです。— 片渕須直 (@katabuchi_sunao) November 12, 2020
“It’s been eight and a half years since the first time I was taken around Kure (for location hunting). Time flies.”
最初に呉のあちこちへ引き回していただいたときからだと、8年半ですね。早いなあ。
— 片渕須直 (@katabuchi_sunao) November 12, 2020
The movie was a 129-minute long adaptation of the award-winning manga of the same name by Fumiyo Kouno—which ran from 2007 to 2009, and had three volumes. It was a wartime slice-of-life centering on the life of young bride Suzu Urano and her new family, and their lives in Kure (a large port city) and Hiroshima from 1933 to just after the Second World War.
The manga had more than one million copies in print, and won the “Excellence Prize” at the Japan Media Arts Festival. The movie adaptation had a fairly successful run as well, grossing a 2.5 billion yen from its entire domestic run (its production budget was 250 million yen). It won the 40th Japan Academy Film Prize for Best Animated Film, the 90th Kinema Junpo Best 10 Award for Best Japanese Film as the second-ever animated film, and the Jury Award at the 41st Annecy International Animated Film Festival, and was nominated for the 45th Annie Award for Best Animated Feature-Independent.
Sunao Katabuchi won the Award of the Minister of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology in Film Category at the 67th Art Encouragement Prize, the 59th Blue Ribbon Award for Best Director as the first-ever animated film director, and the 90th Kinema Junpo Best 10 Award for Best Japanese Film Director as the first-ever animated film director.
On December 20, 2019, an extended version of the movie was released with an additional 30 minutes of footage which held truer to the director’s vision. It was called In This Corner (and Other Corners) of the World [Kono Sekai no (Sarani Ikutsumono) Katasumi ni].
