An approximately 11-minute opening clip of " Paris ni Saku Etoile, " an original animated feature film by director Goro Taniguchi , known for the anime series " Code Geass " and "ONE PIECE FILM RED," has been released on YouTube. The film is set in Paris in the early 1900s and tells the story of Fujiko, who dreams of becoming a painter, and Chizuru, who is drawn to ballet, as they pursue their dreams without giving up amidst difficult times. The released clip depicts the beginning of the story, including Fujiko and Chizuru's fateful meeting in Yokohama, Fujiko's struggles as she tries to become a painter in Japan, and their departure to Paris with her uncle Wakabayashi.
The story is set about 100 years ago, before World War I, and depicts the Belle Époque era when various cultures flourished. Haruichi Shirato, who has worked extensively on setting and historical research for manga, anime, games, and novels, participated as a researcher. He researched everything from the streetscapes of the time to the lives of the people and the props that supported them, resulting in a work that is full of persuasiveness and information even in seemingly insignificant descriptions.
Shirato picked out three key points about the film, and regarding the camera held by Fujiko's uncle, Wakabayashi, he explained, "The camera that Wakabayashi is holding at the Goethe Theater in Yokohama is modeled after the 'Champion Handheld Darkbox,' which was released in 1904. It is one of the oldest Japanese-made cameras, and with the cooperation of the Japan Camera Museum, we were able to photograph the actual camera. However, we don't really know how to hold it and take pictures with it. So we tried to deduce how to hold it and how to take pictures by looking at materials such as the 'Brownie No. 2,' a camera from that era that seems to have a similar structure and shape."
Regarding the Sonoi family, he said, "We set the location in the vicinity of Takadanobaba. In the Meiji era, Takadanobaba was a residential area that preserved nature, with wealthy people's villas along the Ochiai cliff line, and the Takadanobaba Station on the Yamanote Line of the Imperial Japanese Government Railways had just opened in 1910 (Meiji 43). The model for the house is the residence where the great writer Natsume Soseki lived in his later years, and the room where Sonoi's father is located is based in particular on Soseki's study, 'Soseki Sanbo,' where his disciples are said to have come and gone. However, in order to create a Japanese-Western hybrid layout with Western-style furniture placed in a Japanese-style room, some of the finer details are a combination of multiple late Edo and Meiji era buildings."
As the third point, he mentions the Parisian scenery, saying, "The bridge that appears in the scene where Chizuru is strolling through Paris is the Pont Alexandre III, built for the 1900 Paris World's Fair, with huge commemorative columns (Pilons) at its four corners. It is a magnificent bridge over the Seine River that symbolizes the height of the Belle Époque, but then a large ship appears. This is a communal laundry called a Bateau-Lavoir, where women washed their clothes in the river water and dried them on the second floor. In the next shot, a laundress carrying a lot of laundry is depicted in the lower right. Even on the magnificent bridge of the Belle Époque, the lives of ordinary people were overflowing just below it."
The film features character designs by Katsuya Kondo, who has worked on character designs and original drawings for Studio Ghibli films such as " Kiki's Delivery Service" and "Ponyo on the Cliff by the Sea," marking his first collaboration with director Taniguchi. Reiko Yoshida wrote the script, and Yu Yamashita handled character design and chief animation direction. Actress Ami Touma voices the protagonist Fujiko, Rina Arashi voices Chizuru, and Taichi Saotome voices Ruslan, a young Russian man who lives in the same apartment building as Fujiko. The film was released on March 13th.
