New English-Subtitled ‘The Boy and the Beast’ Trailer

An English-subtitled trailer for The Boy and the Beast (Bakemono no Ko), the new film from Japanese director Mamoru Hosoda (The Girl Who Leapt Through Time, Summer Wars, Wolf Children) has been released by the film’s Australian distributor Madman Entertainment.

The Boy and the Beast centers on Kyuta, a boy living in Shibuya in modern-day Tokyo, who befriends and becomes the disciple of the lonesome beast Kumatetsu after he finds himself in a supernatural realm.

“The movie is a training story about a boy who was separated from his parents and becomes a disciple of a bakemono [supernatural creature],” Hosoda, who also wrote the screenplay, was quoted as saying last year by the Anime News Network. “It’s going to be a traditional yet novel story.”

Hosoda is believed by some to be a worthy heir to the legacy of Studio Ghibli’s Hayao Miyazaki. Though he was originally set to direct Howl’s Moving Castle for Ghibli, that film went on to be completed without him, with Miyazaki himself at the helm.

Of his time at Ghibli, Hosoda has said, “Unfortunately, I didn’t get along with the staff on an artistic and logistic level, but still, I’ve learnt many things during my short time there…I thought to deliver a message I had to make tortured works. But in fact, while working on Howl’s, [I] realized being simple and clear was more satisfying to deliver the message. Even if it looks better, complicated things can’t reach the audience as well as simple ones…The Girl Who Leapt Through Time and Summer Wars are the results of this observation.”

Hosoda has, however, found success with his own studio, Studio Chizu, with whom he directed and released Wolf Children in 2012. The film went on to win, among other accolades, the Japan Academy Prize for Animation of the Year.

The Boy and the Beast, Hosoda’s first film since Wolf Children, will debut in Japan on July 11. A U.S. release date hasn’t yet been set.