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Exclusive: Freestyle Digital Media, the digital film distribution division of Byron Allen’s Allen Media Group, has acquired US digital and theatrical rights to Japanese fantasy drama Before The Sunset.

Directed by Hiroshi Akabane, the film revolves around a man known as the ‘God of Management’ who has established a successful business and earned the respect of society, but after retirement finds himself alone and lonely in a nursing home.

He tells his story to a college student volunteer, his only friend, who asks God to grant him one wish. When he wishes he were 20 years old again, he wakes up to find himself as a young man living on a college campus.

Japan’s Hs Productions has produced the film, which stars Hiroaki Tanaka, Masane Tsukayama, Rikako Miura, Syouzou Uesugi, Shugo Nagashima and Mirai Irako.

The original story is by Ryuho Okawa who also serves as Executive Producer.

The...

Adult Swim and Crunchyroll have revealed the characters and stellar English and Japanese voice cast of its anticipated animated series Blade Runner: Black Lotus, inspired by the Blade Runner movie franchise.

Cast includes Jessica Henwick, Arisa Shida, Will Yun Lee, Shinshu Fuji, Samira Wiley, Takako Honda, Brian Cox, Wes Bentley, Josh Duhamel, Taiten Kusunoki, Peyton List, Yoshiko Sakakibara, Stephen Root, Hochu Otsuka, Barkhad Abdi, Takayuki Kinba, Gregg Henry, Masane Tsukayama, Henry Czerny, Akio Nojima, Jason Spisak and Kazuki Yao.

Shinji Aramaki (Appleseed) and Kenji Kamiyama (Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex) will direct all 13 episodes. The series is produced by Alcon Entertainment and animation studio Sola Digital Arts, with Shinichiro Watanabe serving as a creative producer.

Henwick/Shida voice Elle, a female replicant created for a secret and unknown purpose. Lee/Fuji voice Joseph, a mysterious figure who owns a spare parts junkyard in Los Angeles. Wiley/Hona voice Alani Davis,...

This Japanese docudrama is an excellent primer on the scary near- meltdown at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant in 2011. After the earthquake, a tsunami triggered a ‘major nuclear event.’ A group of dedicated engineers struggle against odds to regain control. It’s another 21st Century disaster writ large — we applaud the camaraderie and commitment of the response teams while bureaucratic and political Bs threatens to doom half of Japan. As with last week’s Spacewalker I’m betting that most negative reviews were written by people who saw the English language dub job … in the original Japanese, star Ken Watanabe’s performance is terrific.

Fukushima 50

Blu-ray

Capelight

2020 / Color / 2:39 widescreen / 121 min. / Street Date April 13, 2021 / Available from Amazon / 29.98

Starring: Ken Watanabe, Takumi Saitoh, Kôichi Satô, Tomorô Taguchi, Mark Chinnery, Yuri Nakamura, Justin Leeper, Yasuko Tomita, Hidetaka Yoshioka, Riho Yoshioka, Masane Tsukayama, Masato Hagiwara, Shirô Sano.

Cinematography: Shoji Ehara

Visual Effects...