The original animated film "Fureru" is currently in theaters. As with the "Youth Trilogy," the team has reunited, with director Tatsuyuki Nagai, screenwriter Mari Okada, and character designer and chief animation director Masayoshi Tanaka. Set in Takadanobaba, Tokyo, this work depicts the friendship between three young men who live with a mysterious creature called "Fureru," and is said to be a "challenging work" following the "Youth Trilogy," which depicted adolescent boys and girls set in Chichibu. We spoke to Director Nagai and Mr. Tanaka about the behind-the-scenes production.
-- While the Youth Trilogy depicted adolescent boys and girls set in Chichibu, "Touching" depicts the friendship between three 20-year-old protagonists set in Tokyo. What was the process behind the production?
Director Nagai: The Youth Trilogy had reached a turning point, so the project started with the idea of taking a step forward from there. The keyword "moving to Tokyo" came up early on, and when you say moving to Tokyo, you mean Tokyo. The reason for making three young men the protagonists was that, since most of the stories up until now have been centered around girls, this time we wanted to take on a new challenge and make it a boy-centered story. The decision was made gradually in comparison to the previous works.
-- The three protagonists are childhood friends who grew up on the same island, but why did you choose an island as their hometown?
Director Nagai: Chichibu has a lot of mountainous scenery, so we thought about showing the sea. Up until now, we've avoided the sea because of the amount of energy it takes to draw and the difficulty of how to express it, but with recent developments in CG technology, we feel we can do it without hesitation.
Tanaka: When I was doing waves in hand-drawn animations, I struggled with how to draw the shoreline well. This time, Sublimation came in as 3D and created some really great waves, so I was able to act on the coastline without hesitation.
--How did you shape the characters of the three main characters - Onoda Aki, who works part-time at a bar; Sobue Ryo, a new graduate at a real estate company; and Inohara Yuta, a vocational school student aspiring to be a fashion designer?
Director Nagai: The story of this work revolved around "relationships that change depending on the environment," so I wanted to reveal the relationships between the three characters. As we were working on the character settings, we had Tanaka draw pictures on the spot, and we fed those pictures back into the script as we went along.
Tanaka: The first thing I drew was the three of them in their childhood plus an older brother figure. In fact, in the initial planning stage, Fureru was human and an older brother. In my mind, it was like "Stand by Me," with a character of the same generation plus an older brother. Aki's aura of being shy and quick to use his hands was decided from the beginning, and I made him a beautiful young man with a very pretty face. After Aki was decided, I used the pattern I use when creating characters to assign the elements that Aki doesn't have to Ryo and Yuta, and I broke down the characters' appearances.
--The female characters Kamozawa Juri and Asakawa Nana, who end up living with the three main characters by chance, are also charming.
Director Nagai: This time, the premise was that the main characters were male, and the female characters were not in a heroine-like position like in previous games. Okada came up with the personality settings of strong-willed Juri and girlish Nana, and Tanaka drew the rough draft.
Tanaka: When it comes to female characters, how can we make them easy to understand using stereotypes? That's why I wanted to make Juri a city girl! (laughs) My first image was the one-length bodycon look of the bubble era. So I gave her a very symbolic long straight hairstyle. I created Juri like that, and then assigned all the contrasting elements to Nana as a counterpoint.
◇Fureru was originally humanoid, but he was also a killer whale!
--How did Fureru, who was originally like an older brother to the three main characters, end up becoming a hedgehog-like character?
Tanaka: He first took the shape of a killer whale, then various other creatures, and finally settled on this final evolutionary form. When we decided to make him a hedgehog, I drew a hedgehog based on my image at the time, and it was adopted almost immediately. After that, I googled hedgehogs and was surprised. I was like, "I didn't know hedgehogs were like this, they're completely different."
Director Nagai: That was good.
--I think it's rare for a mascot character like "Fureru" to appear in a work by three people: Director Nagai, Okada, and Tanaka.
Tanaka: Personally, I wasn't all that comfortable with this kind of mascot character. What's more, I had hardly ever drawn a character like this in my career, so it was a bit of a challenge. Even during production, I wasn't really sure what the point of having him in the film was, or how it would look on screen. But when I saw the preview, I thought "Maybe this guy is saving me somehow," and it left me with a good feeling after reading it. I also thought the title "Fureru" was perfect.
Continued in interview (2).
