Studio Ghibli Won't Market Hayao Miyazaki's Final Film HOW DO YOU LIVE? to Maintain Secrecy

Hayao Miyazaki has been working on his next anime film, How Do You Live?, for Studio Ghibli for years. This is his final film, and the legendary Japanese animation studio has been keeping a lot of things about it secret. That secrecy will continue until the movie is actually released in theaters.

There really hasn’t been much released for the film other than a poster of a bird. To keep the secrets of the film safe from leaking, Studio Ghibli and its partners will not do any pre-release advertising or release any advanced information.

Studio Ghibli president and producer Suzuki Toshio explained during an interview with Bungei Shunju magazine that this unusual marketing strategy is being done to build excitement for fans. Miyazaki hasn’t made a film since the 2013 project The Wind Rises.

This means that there will be no ads, trailers or voice cast info. This is certainly a unique way to market a movie! Suzuki said: “They’ll want to see for themselves what the film is about. And to do that, they’ll have to go a theater.”

At one point during the interview, the magazine editor brought up that the film is reportedly based on How Do You Live, a 1937 coming-of-age novel by Genzaburo Yoshino. Over the years, we’ve been sharing the details of this novel thinking that this is the story the film will tell, but that is not the case at all. According to Suzuki, Miyazaki “only borrowed the title.”

So that means all of the plot descriptions that we’ve shared are not the story that Miyazaki’s How Do You Live? will tell, and now I’m even more excited!

When previously talking about the film and why he was making it, Miyazaki said, "I am making this movie because I do not have the answer." It’s also explained that the movie is a gift for Miyazaki's grandson. Studio Ghibli co-founder and producer Toshio Suzuki said, "It's his way of saying 'Grandpa is moving on to the next world, but he's leaving behind this film.'" Suzuki has also described the film as “fantasy on a grand scale.”

The movie will be released in Japanese theaters on July 14, 2023. There’s no word on when How Do You Live? will be released in the United States.

Via: Variety