Birthday Wonderland

Synopsis:

Trailer:

Streaming Platforms:

• Shahid

Characters:

• Akane (Main) - Voice Actors: Matsuoka, Mayu, Reimold, Lisa, Ruiz, Greta, Lacombe, Lila, Granato, Jolanda
• Chi (Supporting) - Voice Actors: Maniglio, Giulia, Di Nardo, Audrey, Molina, Daniela, Watanabe, Anne, Clark, Allegra
• Doropo (Supporting) - Voice Actors: Pozzi, Stefano, Yajima, Akiko, Losi, Jennifer
• Gu, Zan (Supporting) - Voice Actors: Moneta, Claudio, Fujiwara, Keiji, Piechaczyk, Olivier, Morgenstern, Tommy, Lepley, Ben
• Hippocrates (Supporting) - Voice Actors: Ghignone, Luca, Dumond, Cédric, Ichimura, Masachika, Todaro, Frank
• Midori (Supporting) - Voice Actors: Aso, Kumiko
• Pipo (Supporting) - Voice Actors: Bonanomi, Giada, Hennequin, Charlotte, Touyama, Nao, Lastra, Jackie

Staff:

• Honda, Fuminori (Producer)
• Takeeda, Yoshinori (Producer)
• Hara, Keiichi (Director, Theme Song Lyrics)
• Nagatomo, Takakazu (Episode Director)
• milet (Theme Song Performance, Inserted Song Performance)
• Fuuki, Harumi (Music)
• Gibert, Alexandre (ADR Director)
• Hiraiwa, Shiori (In-Between Animation)
• Huang, Chengxi (Key Animation)
• Igarashi, Yuuki (Key Animation)
• Ishihara, Mitsuru (Key Animation)
• Ishikawa, Mitsuhisa (Planning)
• Itazu, Yoshimi (Key Animation)
• Itou, Hideki (Key Animation, Animation Director)
• Itou, Yuuta (Key Animation)
• Kagawa, Megumi (Key Animation)
• Kaneda, Riko (In-Between Animation)
• Kashiwaba, Sachiko (Original Creator)
• Kawano, Etsuko (Key Animation)
• Kim, Gyeong-eun (2nd Key Animation)
• Kisanuki, Maya (In-Between Animation)
• Kobayashi, Naoki (Animation Director, Key Animation)
• Kobayashi, Mari (2nd Key Animation)
• Kojima, Makiyo (In-Between Animation)
• Kusumoto, Yuuya (Background Art)
• Kusumoto, Maya (Color Design)
• Kuvshinov, Ilya (Character Design, Mechanical Design, Animation Check, Key Animation, Setting)
• Maeda, Sonoka (In-Between Animation)
• Maruo, Miho (Screenplay)
• Matsumoto, Norio (Key Animation)
• Matsuzaki, Youko (Planning)
• Morishita, Katsuji (Executive Producer)
• Murakami, Ryuunosuke (2nd Key Animation)
• Nabana, Yoshinori (2nd Key Animation)
• Nakahara, Hisafumi (Key Animation)
• Nakamura, Takashi (Art Director)
• Nishitani, Shuuhei (Key Animation)
• Nishiyama, Shigeru (Editing)
• Shimoyama, Tomohisa (Key Animation, Animation Director)
• Shinkai, Ryousuke (Key Animation, In-Between Animation)
• Souen, Yuusuke (2nd Key Animation)
• Sugimoto, Isao (Key Animation)
• Sugino, Sachiko (Key Animation)
• Suzuki, Michiyo (Key Animation)
• Suzuki, Masato (In-Between Animation)
• Takenaka, Shingo (Key Animation, Animation Director)
• Takeuchi, Kasumi (Animation Check, In-Between Animation)
• Takeuchi, Yukari (Assistant Animation Director)
• Tamura, Satsuki (2nd Key Animation)
• Tanaka, Kouji (Director of Photography)
• ... and 2 more staff

Reviews:

• User Ahnix (Score: 6/10):
  This movie makes me very conflicted, I want to like this movie, and I do, but there's no doubt in my mind that there's a lot of flaws holding it back. Overall: 6 TLDR: Did this movie make me laugh? Definitely, and fairly often, actually. Did it make me roll my eyes? Quite often on that count as well, haha. But most importantly, did I enjoy my movie going experience? I would say yes, and I think I can recommend it without too many reservations. Character: 7 I want to begin with this category because it definitely feels like the writers wanted this film to be a character drivenbildungsroman. There are a lot of likable characters present (in particular, I really like the main duo of Akane and Chii, and also momma Midori, although admittedly, her role in the movie is pretty negligible), but the issue with all of them is that they feel one dimensional. Even the main protagonist, Akane, feels a bit flat. The movie is supposed to be a coming of age story about her growing up and taking initiative in her own life, and we see her transformation in the end, but it feels largely unearned. This is in large part due to the plot device of the momentum anchor, which I absolutely HATE. I won’t go into too much detail here to avoid spoilers, but everything about the anchor makes me roll my eyes, especially when it’s brought up again near the end of the movie. The other gripe I have is that the alchemist and Pipo feel like they exist only to spout exposition or move the story along, and are largely under-utilized. Overall, there was a lot of potential here but it falls short of creating super memorable characters.nnVisuals: 9nnI found out about this movie, and ultimately watched it, because I’m a huge fan of Ilya Kushinov, the artist behind all of the visual designs. This movie is without a doubt gorgeous. Due to the quality of the visuals, there are some obvious drops in framerate or moments where a still frame is held for just a tad bit long, but I’m more than ready to forgive the movie on that count because, unfortunately, we don’t live in a perfect world where studios have infinite time and money to pour into each project. There’s a lot of great color imagery as well, aligning the themes of the story with the visual experience. This movie very clearly takes heavy inspiration from Studio Ghibli’s takes on fantasy and worldbuilding. It doesn’t achieve the same levels of believability in my opinion, but the victorian-esque fantasy world that is constructed is still quite lovely. The one thing that disappoints me is that unlike Miyazaki’s works, it doesn’t perfectly attach the elements of fantasy with the message that the movie is trying to tell. I was fortunate enough to go to a viewing of the movie where Kushinov flew in all the way from Japan to talk about…
• User MagicGalaxy (Score: 2/10):
  Two words: cat balls Okay, now for the more serious overview: It's unfortunate that a film with such nice animation has such cliché, boring, and weird writing. The animation is good for what it is, and that's that. The world building makes no sense, the characters are surface level **at best,** it has weird flashback character cuts, it has no idea how to hold tension or pacing, the gags are dumb, the protag is a Mary Sue that suddenly gets better when she needs to, AHHHHHHHH. You can't even appreciate the animation really because of how stupid the movie is. I saw another negative review,claiming that this movie has good elements, but has a poorly written villain and is hurt most by being a propaganda against poor people (or those who come from the slums, seen as bad, etc.). That is giving the movie too much credit. This thing is a complete mess that has no idea what it is doing. To call it propaganda would imply it has a coherent plot. nnDo not watch this. Colossal waste of 2 hours. nn2 / 10
• User ddaisy (Score: 6/10):
  I really wanted to enjoy this movie but I feel like the movie is rushed with lack of detail, explanation within character relationships, and seems a bit cheesy within the storyline. it's just BAM this happens and that, and you just go along for the ride slowly piecing things together. I absolutely ADORE Ilya Kuvshinov art which you can spy throughout the film and honestly I expected more quality rather than some season 2 of a good show budget. I skipped through and it felt a little painful to watch considering it seemed they threw things in to see if it'd work out ://
• ... and 4 more reviews

News:

• North American Anime & Manga Releases for October (10/05/2020)
• +Ultra Announces 2019-20 Lineup (03/14/2019)
• Anime Movie 'Birthday Wonderland' Announces Additional Staff and Cast Members (02/18/2019)
• Keiichi Hara Directs 'Birthday Wonderland' Anime Movie (01/07/2019)

Forum Topics:

• Birthday Wonderland Episode 1 Discussion
• US Theatrical Release Dates