If you’ve seen The Girl Who Leapt Through Time, Summer Wars, or Wolf Children, you know a Mamoru Hosoda film is something to get excited about. This gorgeous trailer for Hosoda’s upcoming movie Belle, a.k.a. Ryu to Sobakasu no Hime, will do absolutely nothing to dispel you of this notion.
Belle is yet another film where Hosoda is exploring a virtual world. This time, it’s “U, a massive online network with over 5 billion registered users” according to Studio Chizu.
Here’s the official synopsis: “The protagonist of this story, Suzu, is a 17-year old high school girl living with her father in a rural town of Kochi — their town is a textbook definition of depopulation in the Japanese countryside. Wounded by the loss of her mother at a young age, Suzu one day discovers the massive online world, ‘U,’ and dives into this alternate reality as her avatar, Belle. Before long, all of U’s eyes are fixed on Belle (Suzu), when one day the mysterious and infamous Dragon-like figure appears before her.”
Man, that is gorgeous, and since Hosoda is writing and directing, you know it’s going to be a masterpiece at best, and utterly fantastic at worst. Goodness only knows how long it’ll be before we can see Belle in the West but if you happen to be in Japan this summer you can catch it then.