FUNimation to Release Japanese Academy Award Winner SUMMER WARS

An Anime Family Saves the World in this Film Festival Favorite Source: FUNimation Entertainment Official Site: s-wars.jp (Japan) Special Thanks to Jackie Smith and Manny Alcala FUNimation Entertainment has acquired the North American home entertainment, theatrical, broadcast and merchandise rights to the animated sci-fi action film SUMMER WARS (Samaa Woozu, 2009) from NTV (Nippon Television Network).

Released in August 2009 in Japan by Warner Brothers, SUMMER WARS is produced by Madhouse and directed by Mamoru Hosoda. SUMMER WARS is the second full-length film that Hosoda has made as a freelance director. The first, THE GIRL WHO LEAPT THROUGH TIME (Toki wo Kakeru Shoujo, 2006), an animated movie in which the teenage heroine discovers that she can travel to the past, received rave reviews from critics and audiences worldwide. SUMMER WARS reunites many who worked on that film, including scriptwriter Satoko Okudera and character designer Yoshiyuki Sadamoto. The SUMMER WARS story begins with Kenji Koiso, a timid math prodigy who seems better suited for virtual worlds than his more intimidating high school. When class cutie Natsuki Shinohara asks Kenji to accompany her on a family trip to celebrate her great-grandmother’s 90th birthday, he instantly agrees, not realizing she intends to present him to her family as her fiance - a ruse that forces Kenji, who hides behind an avatar online, to role-play in the real world as well.

Natsuke and her

The plot thickens after Kenji solves a math riddle that inadvertently brings a worldwide social networking site to its knees and throws the real world into confusion. Suddenly, this large family in rural Japan must work together to stave off a world crisis. SUMMER WARS has screened at film festivals worldwide, including the Sitges International Film Festival of Catalonia, the Berlin International Film Festival, the Sydney Film Festival, Locarno Film Festival, the Hawaii International Film Festival, and the New York International Children’s Festival and was nominated for an award at the prestigious Annecy International Animation Film Festival. Hosoda’s previous offering, THE GIRL WHO LEAPT THROUGH TIME, won the Special Distinction for Feature Films in 2007. SUMMER WARS also won the prize for Best Animated Film at the 33rd Japanese Academy Awards earlier this year and made an impressive $18.3 million at the Japanese box office. FUNimation Entertainment will release the film theatrically in 2010 and on DVD and Blu-ray in 2011.

About FUNimation Entertainment

FUNimation Entertainment, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Navarre Corporation, is the leading company for home video sales of Japanese animation in the United States. FUNimation has a proven formula for launching and advancing brands, and manages a full spectrum of rights for most of its brands including broadcasting, licensing, production, internet, and home video sales and distribution. For more information about FUNimation Entertainment and its brands, visit funimation.com.