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Makoto Shinkai's "Your Name" has just set another box office record!

The post ‘Your Name’ Becomes All-Time No. 1 Japanese Film in China appeared first on Cartoon Brew.

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The world of the Oscar-nominated "Dam Keeper" short is turning into a traditionally-animated series for Hulu in Japan.

The post EXCLUSIVE: ‘The Dam Keeper’ To Become An Animated Series for Hulu in Japan appeared first on Cartoon Brew.

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American distributor Funimation plans a one-week Oscar qualification run this December.

The post Japan’s Smash Hit ‘Your Name’ Will Make An Oscar Run This Year appeared first on Cartoon Brew.

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An inspiring DIY project for anyone who creates digital art on a tablet.

The post Japanese Artist Builds Custom Cintiq-Embedded Desk appeared first on Cartoon Brew.

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"Your Name" has captivated Japanese audiences in a way that no other film has since the release of Disney's "Frozen."

The post ‘Your Name’ Reigns Over Japan’s Box Office For Seventh Week appeared first on Cartoon Brew.

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Millions of people across the world work for voluntary organisations and invest their abundant energies into helping their communities. Historically, establishments of voluntary organisations date back to at least the nineteenth century, when some of the world’s largest voluntary organisations, such as the Red Cross, were established to help people in need for free. To date, volunteer work remains a popular activity among the public worldwide.

The post The power of volunteering: you make me happy and I make you happy appeared first on OUPblog.

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A music video designed for mobile devices for VMO’s new album "Catastrophic Anonymous."

The post ‘Halved Feat Chip King (The Body)’ by Toshikazu Tamura appeared first on Cartoon Brew.

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"Ghost in the Shell" maker Production I.G. travels back in time for its new feature, "Miss Hokusai."

The post ‘Miss Hokusai’ Trailer: GKIDS Sets U.S. Release for October appeared first on Cartoon Brew.

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In 2002 I faced a dilemma relating to an editorial project that perhaps only another historian can appreciate. Scrambling to complete the Introduction to Twentieth-Century China: New Approaches, I had to figure out how long to say the eponymous period had lasted.

The post How long was my century? appeared first on OUPblog.

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30 years of work, 2,500 items on display—this is a must-visit for any Ghibli fan.

The post Massive Studio Ghibli Exhibition Opens Tomorrow In Tokyo appeared first on Cartoon Brew.

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"Gender has nothing to do with making movies," Nishimura said, after claiming that women were not a good choice for directing fantasy films.

The post Former Ghibli Producer Yoshiaki Nishimura Apologizes for Sexist Comments appeared first on Cartoon Brew.

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Women are too realistic to be capable of directing fantasy films, says Ghibli producer.

The post Studio Ghibli Producer Claims Women Are Too ‘Realistic’ To Direct Their Films appeared first on Cartoon Brew.

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In Can I Build Another Me? by Shinsuke Yoshitake, a young boy comes up with a master plan to avoid doing his chores: he spends all his pocket money on a robot to take his place. “From now on, you’re going to be the new me! […] But don’t let anyone know. You must behave exactly like me.”

But in order to be exactly like the young boy, the robot needs to know everything about the person he will be imitating. All sorts of questions, exploring everything from the boy’s physical characteristics, to likes and dislikes, via feelings and much more follow. Gradually the robot builds up a fairly comprehensive picture of what the boy is like, but will the master plan to avoid chores succeed or will Mum see through the robot straight away?

This very funny, marvellously philosophical picture book offers so many opportunities for thinking about who we are, why we behave the way we do and how we can and do change over time. It’s reflective and reassuring, creating a space full of laughter to talk about feelings, hopes and friendships. Every page offers lots of opportunities for conversations, at the same time as being full of acute and humurous observations about what it can be like being a child, trying to learn how to navigate your way in the world.

Yoshitake’s illustrations, often reminiscent of comic strips, with multiple panels on each page, are full of fabulous detail offering as much to pore over as the text does. Stylishly designed with just a few colours and a great variety of pace (some pages have lots of sections, others are given over to a single spread), the relatively simplicity of the line drawings allows Yoshitake’s fantastical imagination to flourish.

An empowering, laughter-fuelled, imagination-sparking, reflection-inducing delight, Can I Build Another Me? is meaty and marvellous, silly and serious all at once. A triumph!

We don’t ever really need an excuse for making robots out of junk. Nevertheless, we gratefully took reading Can I Build Another Me? as an opportunity to get creative with old plastic boxes and the glue gun, to create a few mini-me-robots:

Whether they are really just like us or not, they definitely have a sense of personality!

As well as making mini-me-robots, we made keepsake booklets about ourselves, inspired by the questions raised by Yoshitake in his book.

We really enjoyed filling them in, and I suspect they will be great fun to look back on in a year or more, to see how our feelings about ourselves and who we are has changed.

I learned a few things about my own kids as we filled in these booklets. “I can put a whole carrot in my mouth,” wrote M…., whilst J likes DIY and ceilidhs.

If you want to have a go at making your own Can I Build Another Me? inspired booklet, click here to download the pdf file to print off (we printed the pages back to back, then folded them in half and stapled them together along the spine).

Whilst making our robots and filling in our notebooks we listened to:

Love Me for Who I Am by Brady Rymer

I Am Not A Robot by Marina and The Diamonds

You won’t find another fool like me by the New Seekers

Other activities which might work well alongside reading include:

Making a tree to match your personality. There are loads of tree crafts, but I like the look of this, this, this and this.

Turning yourself into a robot, with the help of a large cardboard box and Viviane Schwarz’s fabulous Welcome to your Awesome Robot

Creating a nesting doll set that looks like you – you can get blank nesting doll sets (google “blank wooden Russian doll set” for example, to find lots of offerings) and then paint them to show all the different versions of you there are inside your skin. You could do ones with different facial expressions, for example.

If you liked this post you might like these other posts by me, featuring picture books with a philosophical theme:

The multi-award winning I am Henry Finch written by Alexis Deacon and illustrated by Viviane Schwarz

This is not my hat by Jon Klassen (with an interview with the author/illustrator)

Little Answer by Tim Hopgood

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Disclosure: I was sent a free review copy of this book by the publisher. NB Although the book was translated from Japanese, no named translator is given in the bibliographic details.

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It's the first European film that Japan's legendary Studio Ghibli has co-produced.

The post Watch the Trailer for Michael Dudok de Wit’s ‘The Red Turtle,’ Debuting At Cannes appeared first on Cartoon Brew.

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Discussion Guide & Common Core Teacher Guide

By Cynthia Leitich Smith
for Cynsations

Kathryn Tanquary is the first-time author of The Night Parade (Sourcebooks Fire, 2016). From the promotional copy:

"I thought you might sleep through it." The creature smiled.

Saki's voice was little more than a whisper. "Sleep through what?"

It leaned over. She stared into its will-o'-the-wisp eyes.

"The Night Parade, of course."

The last thing Saki Yamamoto wants to do for her summer vacation is trade in exciting Tokyo for the antiquated rituals and bad cell reception of her grandmother's village. Preparing for the Obon ceremony is boring. Then the local kids take interest in Saki and she sees an opportunity for some fun, even if it means disrespecting her family's ancestral shrine on a malicious dare.

But as Saki rings the sacred bell, the darkness shifts. A death curse has been invoked...and Saki has three nights to undo it. With the help of three spirit guides and some unexpected friends, Saki must prove her worth-or say goodbye to the world of the living forever...

In writing your story, did you ever find yourself concerned with how to best approach "edgy" behavior on the part of your characters? If so, what were your thoughts, and what did you conclude? Why do you think your decision was the right one?

Though my protagonist certainly isn’t the most “edgy” in terms of behavior, she does start the story with a pretty big chip on her shoulder.

Saki’s act of rebellion is the catalyst that sets off the main events of the plot, so it had to be significant enough to provoke consequences without losing too much sympathy for her character.

To find this balance, her motivation was the key. From the beginning, Saki is a flawed hero with a lot of internal conflict; she’s trying to manage a toxic adolescent social life and her own need for acceptance from her peers, so it’s understandable when she caves to some of that pressure and makes a few bad decisions.

Making a big mistake may seem like the end of the world to a lot of people—and Saki certainly thinks so in the story—but I decided right from the concept stage that I wanted to deconstruct that idea. A lot of the books I read growing up had a protagonist with a very strong sense of self, but Saki doesn’t have that yet. Her weaknesses are very human, and sometimes even a little petty. She’s still getting to know the person she’s becoming and that’s okay. Another key theme of the story is forgiveness, and Saki’s journey is all about second chances.

As a fantasy writer, going in, did you have a sense of how events/themes in your novel might parallel or speak to events/issues in our real world? Or did this evolve over the course of many drafts?

Writing longhand in Osaka

The theme certainly evolved as the characters found their voices, but a sense of duality was there from the very beginning: city and country, young and old, modern and traditional, humans and spirits.

Anytime these things are put side-by-side there’s a tendency to pit them against one another. Go one step further and people start to separate themselves based on these perceived qualities.

One of the major themes of Saki’s story is finding the balance. Part of her journey towards self-discovery is recognizing that she can be dynamic and adaptable, and that she can inhabit more than one world at a time. In a world that seems increasingly divided in its thinking, I believe that’s a quality we should all aspire toward.

On a more concrete level, the story speaks to the issues of age, multi-generational families and tradition. Saki understands on some level why some of the rituals her family performs during the Obon holidays are important, but until she has an experience of her own she doesn’t feel as connected to the tradition.

Younger generations worldwide are facing similar experience gaps. The world we live in now is simply not the same as the world our parents and grandparents grew up in, so unless we invest some of our time in communication there is a lot we risk losing. Fittingly, this was one of the themes that took the longest to mature.

In both fantasy and reality, understanding the past is usually the surest way to help prepare for a brighter future.

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A new music video by Japanese animator Takashi Ohashi.

The post ‘Nakaniwa’ by Takashi Ohashi appeared first on Cartoon Brew.

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Ghibli's first international co-production is directed by "Father and Daughter" director Michael Dudok de Wit.

The post Studio Ghibli’s ‘The Red Turtle’ Will Premiere At Cannes appeared first on Cartoon Brew.

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The Polygon Pictures series directed by Goro Miyazaki earns some international recognition.

The post ‘Ronja, The Robber’s Daughter’ Wins International Kids Emmy appeared first on Cartoon Brew.

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On a summer day an strange man who teaches Russian at the beach took me to a town.

The post ‘Zdravstvuite!’ by Yoko Yuki appeared first on Cartoon Brew.

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Filmmaker David OReilly reports on his experiences at the one-of-a-kind Georama animation festival in Tokyo.

The post David OReilly on Tokyo’s Georama, A Different Kind of Animation Festival appeared first on Cartoon Brew.

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It is no secret that India-Japan relations have been on a strong positive trajectory over the past 18 months. Soon after taking office in 2014, Prime Minister Narendra Modi made Japan his first foreign destination outside of India’s immediate neighborhood and while in Tokyo, he and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe upgraded the India-Japan relationship

The post Time to follow through on India and Japan’s promises appeared first on OUPblog.

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One of Japan's biggest film hits of 2015 is headed to U.S. theaters.

The post U.S. Release Date Confirmed for ‘The Boy and the Beast’ appeared first on Cartoon Brew.

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Discover the art of Mateusz Urbanowicz, Cartoon Brew's Artist of the Day!

The post Artist of the Day: Mateusz Urbanowicz appeared first on Cartoon Brew.

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A music video for Vampillia's new album "The Divine Move."

The post ‘Lilac’ by Toshikazu Tamura appeared first on Cartoon Brew.

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Taking place entirely inside an airport terminal, New Chitose Airport International Animation Festival is a particularly refreshing festival that is not to be missed.

The post Festival Review: New Chitose, The World’s Only Airport Animation Festival appeared first on Cartoon Brew.

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