Underplayed Gems

Children Who Chase Lost Voices (2011)

Children Who Chase Lost Voices poster
Original title
星を追う子ども
Directed by
Makoto Shinkai
Genre
drama anime and manga, romance anime and manga, Adventure, Drama, Fantasy, Romance
Country
Japan
Runtime
1h 56m
Rated
PG
Rating
7.3 of 10 from 795 voters
Elsewhere
IMDb
The 3D catalogue: film cases on wooden shelves, with the cat sitting at the counter next to its greeting.

The catalogue in 3D

The film shelves have a room of their own that you can walk around in. The cat behind the counter is the AI Catbot, and they pick real films from the same catalogue when you tell them what you feel like watching. Nothing is for sale, here or in there. Go in from here and this film is already out on the counter, with more like it waiting on the shelf next to it.

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How it feels

An elementary school girl named Asuna finds a mysterious creature and meets a boy from an underground world. She travels with her teacher into a hidden realm beneath the earth to seek answers about life and death.

adventurousmelancholicwondrouscontemplativegentlefantasticalsomberatmospheric

What happens

Children Who Chase Lost Voices (Japanese: 星を追う子ども, Hepburn: Hoshi wo Ou Kodomo; lit. 'Children Who Chase Stars'), also known as Journey to Agartha, is a 2011 Japanese anime fantasy film written and directed by Makoto Shinkai, and produced by CoMix Wave Films. It follows an elementary school girl and her substitute teacher travelling to the depths of the world. The film was released in Japan on May 7, 2011. It was released on DVD and Blu-ray in Japan on November 25, 2011. The film was previously licensed by Sentai Filmworks in North America and released on DVD and Blu-ray in November 2012. On May 9, 2019 it was announced that Sentai had lost the North American license, causing the releases to go out of print. On March 10, 2022, GKIDS announced that they have licensed Children Who Chase Lost Voices, along with three other works by Shinkai, and the film was re-released on home video in 2023. (from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA)

More like this

This page is from Underplayed Gems. Not quite it? You can browse by genre, country and year, or take this one into the 3D catalogue and ask the Catbot for something closer.