New Image Revealed for Hayao Miyazaki's New Film THE BOY AND THE HERON
A new photo has been shared Hayao Miyazaki’s final animated film The Boy and the Heron, which was previously titled How Do You Live? The image comes courtesy of the San Sebastián Film Festival, which announced that Miyazaki’s film would be making its European debut at the festival.
The official synopsis for the film reads: “Through encounters with his friends and uncle, follows a teenage boy’s psychological development. He enters a magical world with a talking grey heron after finding an abandoned tower in his new town.”
The story for the film is described as follows:
The film is set in Japan during World War Two and centres around a young boy named Mahito whose mother is killed in a fire. Shortly thereafter his father, who works in a factory producing fighter planes, marries his late wife's younger sister Natsuko, and moves the family to her large ancestral home in the countryside.
Mahito, who is resentful of Natsuko for taking his mother's place, begins to explore the area around the house and discovers a mysterious tower which he is told not to enter. He also encounters a grey heron that can speak (as seen on the film's poster) who claims Mahito's mother is in fact alive and in the tower waiting to be rescued. Mahito dismisses this claim, but when his new stepmother disappears into the tower he decides to rescue her.
Once he enters, he is transported into an alternate world full of magic where his quest brings him into contact with new friends and enemies alike.
The movie features the voices of Soma Santoki, Masaki Suda (The Backwater), singer Aimyon, Yoshino Kimura (Confessions), Shōhei Hino (As Long as We Both Shall Live), Ko Shibasaki (47 Ronin), Takuya Kimura (Howl’s Moving Castle), and more.
Gkids has picked up the North American rights to the film and it will be released in the U.S.