Pompo the Cinephile North American release has been given a premiere date from distributor GKIDS.
The animated movie about the art of making movies will be given a limited theatrical release through a partnership between the distributor and Fathom Events. The subtitled version of the movie will begin screenings on April 27, while the English language dub will premiere the following day, on April 28. Special preview screenings will also be held at unspecified dates sometime before the official release.
The movie is directed by Takayuki Hirao, an anime director who is best known for his work with Demon Slayer: Kimetsu No Yaiba studio Ufotable. Hirao previously directed the anime film The Garden of Sinners: Paradox Spiral and the anime adaptation of Bandai Namco's action-RPG series, God Eater. The movie was produced by the new animation studio CLAP, which is also working on an anime adaptation of the popular light novel series The Tunnel to Summer, the Exit of Goodbyes. The movie was screened at the 2021 Fantasia Film Festival, where it was nominated for the Satoshi Kon Award. The film has also been nominated or an ANNIE Award.
The movie's Japanese voice cast includes Hiroya Shimizu, who previously starred in the live-action adaptation of Chihayafuru as the antagonistic Akihito Sudo. Joining Shimizu are voice actor Konomi Kohara, who previously played the role of Chika Fujiwara in Kaguya-sama: Love is War, and anime industry veteran Akio Otsuka, who is best known to international audiences as the Japanese voice of Solid Snake in Hideo Kojima's Metal Gear Solid series.
Pompo the Cinephile originally began as a manga series created by author and artist Shogo Sugitani. The manga was originally released through the website Pixiv, but has also been collected and published in print by Media Factory. The series is now available in English through publisher Seven Seas Entertainment.
GKIDS has built up a reputation for being the distributor behind the North American releases of several of the most critically acclaimed animated movies of the last several years, including Satoshi Kon's Tokyo Godfathers, studio Trigger's Promare, and most recently, the latest work of celebrated director Mamoru Hosoda, Belle, which was one of Japan's highest grossing films of 2021. GKIDS released Belle in the United States in January, where it managed to pull in over $3 million USD within its first two weeks of limited release, making it Hosoda's highest grossing film in the region. The distributor also recently teamed up with Tubi to release a selection of its films on the free streaming service.
Source: GKIDS
