2025 is a wonderful year to be an animation fan. In addition to various individual titles hitting the festival circuit like All You Need is Kill, ChaO, Space Cadet, and Arco, there’re also full-fledged festivals like Animation is Film and Annecy International Animation Film Festival (among many others), and regular releases of mainstream titles like The Bad Guys 2, Ne Zha 2, and Dan Da Dan: Evil Eye (with Scarlet, Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba – The Movie: Infinity Castle Part I and Chainsaw Man — The Movie: Reze Arc on the way). Among all these are repertory screenings, opportunities for audiences to catch up with older films that they may not have seen just yet. Along these lines, Crunchyroll and Sony Pictures Releasing have established a new series titled “Anime Nights” in which select theaters will host a single-night event of a different title, including but not limited to Miss Kobayashi’s Dragon Maid: A Lonely Dragon Wants to be Loved on October 20th and OVERLORD on November 17th. Screening on August 18th is Mamoru Hosoda’s 2015 adventure fantasy The Boy and the Beast (バケモノの子), a fabulous tale for young adults and older looking for a reminder that life is far richer and more satisfying when shared.
A scene from THE BOY AND THE BEAST. Photo courtesy of Studio Chizu. © 2015 THE BOY AND THE BEAST FILM PARTNERS. Licensed by Crunchyroll, LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Opting to live on his own than live with his family upon the sudden death of his mother, nine-year-old Ren (voiced by Aoi Miyazaki) struggles with life on the streets between finding food, shelter, and avoiding the police who will send him back to his relatives. One day, upon meeting a spirit guide in the alleys of Shibuya, he’s approached by a hooded individual whose brash persona grates against the impetuous child and is offered an apprenticeship. Seeking to grow stronger in order to live on his own, Ren reluctantly follows and enters the world of Jutengai, a place just outside human reality in which spirit animals live and some train to become lords so that they may reincarnate as gods. That hooded figure is Kumatetsu (voiced by Koji Yakusho), one of two next in line for lordship and with Ren, now called Kyuta due to his age, the two set out on a series of adventures that will change them both forever.
L-R: Kumatetsu voiced by Koji Yakusho and Ren/Kyuto voiced by Aoi Miyazaki in THE BOY AND THE BEAST. © 2015 THE BOY AND THE BEAST FILM PARTNERS. Licensed by Crunchyroll, LLC. All Rights Reserved.
To date, Studio Chizu has produced seven of Hosoda’s films starting with 2006’s The Girl Who Leapt Through Time and through the upcoming Scarlet. Of the four films by Hosoda that I’ve seen, each balances drama, romance, comedy, and action as it tells a story of growing up and trusting in one’s self through a fantasy lens. For BELLE (2021), it’s the refinding of the voice lost in the wake of processing grief just in time to prevent great personal disaster. For Mirai (2018), it’s coming to terms with the role of a sibling, wading through what makes it grand and terrible yet embracing it all the same. For Summer Wars (2009), it’s a mistaken identity comedy with a sci-fi apocalypse bend for all to recognize that collective strength can stop anything. Originally released in 2015, The Boy and the Beast is an interesting mix of all of these and blends them without feeling unoriginal or uninspired. Ren/Kyuta possesses immense pain in the aftermath of his mother’s death and her family’s refusal to see him as anything more than the lone heir to the family name as the only boy child, even going so far as to refuse to seek out Ren’s father (the parents divorced prior to the start of the film). Occurring at the same time, Kumatetsu finds himself denied the right to challenge Iozen (voiced by Kazuhiro Yamaji) to be the new lord because he lacks the proper temperament that only the experience of teaching can provide (therefore prompting the invitation to Ren). Both are positioned as surly and lonely, desperate for connection and yet refusing it at near ever turn because cultivating them creates opportunity for pain that each would prefer to avoid. Despite having seen stories like this one countless times, Hosoda knows how to structure his scripts so that any presumption on our part is disrupted by countless surprises, laying the groundwork throughout for powerful emotion reactions that knock you flat.
L-R: Ren/Kyuto voiced by Aoi Miyazaki and Kumatetsu voiced by Koji Yakusho in THE BOY AND THE BEAST. © 2015 THE BOY AND THE BEAST FILM PARTNERS. Licensed by Crunchyroll, LLC. All Rights Reserved.
A great deal of the wallop comes from the performances from the voice cast in collaboration from the animation. Ren’s transformation as Kyuta — both as a young boy of 9 and a young adult of 17 (voiced by Shota Sometani) — comes as much from the ways Miyazaki and Sometani infuse the animation with honest youthful turmoil and reluctant affection as how the animators construct the presentation of Kyuta, channeling the longing for something beyond himself while maintaining the walls that protect the hole in his heart from growing larger. (In the case of the narrative, this is both metaphorical and literal within the fantastical story that manifests human pain into a physical reality.) There’s a certain expectation that Ren/Kyuta will grow into a fully-formed person and that Kumatetsu will do the same, the narrative tool of pairing a reluctant teacher with a reluctant student not altogether original, but the way in which it is presented produces its own original and expressive climax that upends expectations. Again, it’s the handshake between voice cast and animation as Koji maintains Kumatestsu’s gruffness regardless of situation while the animation eschews hyperreality for grounded presentations of these anthropomorphic beasts, from physical positioning to flop sweat, there’s nary a moment in which the audience doesn’t believe in the tangible existence of these characters within the animated space.
A scene from THE BOY AND THE BEAST. © 2015 THE BOY AND THE BEAST FILM PARTNERS. Licensed by Crunchyroll, LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Only adding to the adventure is composer Masakatsu Takagi’s score which fills the audio space with a wonderous sense of adventure. Takagi worked with Hosoda on Wolf Children and Mirai, as well, and, admittedly, speaking as someone who frequently listens to the 2023 album “STUDIO CHIZU Music Journey Vol. 1 — Cinematic Orchestra 2022” performed by the Tokyo Philharmonic Orchestra and various guests, Takagi’s music has a way of bolstering the emotional quotient of any scene, whether it’s Ren meeting spirit guide Chico for the first time, deciding to learn Kumatetsu’s footwork separate from Kumatetsu’s poor verbal instruction, the eventual battle for position between Kumatetsu and Izoen, or the climactic scene that pushes Ren to accept himself as the person he needs to be. Each one is just a marvel that, if one isn’t careful, will take them out of the scene and float away on the notes themselves.
L-R: Hyakushūbō voiced by Lily Franky, Ren/Kyuto voiced by Aoi Miyazaki, and Tatara voiced by Yo Oizumi in THE BOY AND THE BEAST. Photo courtesy of Studio Chizu. © 2015 THE BOY AND THE BEAST FILM PARTNERS. Licensed by Crunchyroll, LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Do keep in mind that Hosoda’s films reside in a tricky dual reality in which some films are under Crunchyroll/Sony Pictures and others under GKIDS Films. This summer, in fact, saw theatrical re-releases of Wolf Children in May and Summer Wars in July, with The Girl Who Leapt Through Time returning in September, each with a new 4K restoration that’s being supported by a physical re-release, as well. At this time, The Boy and the Beast doesn’t appear to be receiving similar treatment with this inclusion in Crunchyroll’s Anime Nights being just an opportunity to visit/re-visit the title in theaters for those who want to. Interestingly, the film re-release on August 18th falls nearly halfway between its original release 10 years ago in July for Japan and September for the United States; though, again, that doesn’t seem to be part of the marketing for this title and isn’t being communicated in any way as important to this one-night event.
The point? Now is a great opportunity to go.
L-R: Iozen voiced by Kazuhiro Yamaji and Kumatetsu voiced by Koji Yakusho in THE BOY AND THE BEAST. Photo courtesy of Studio Chizu. © 2015 THE BOY AND THE BEAST FILM PARTNERS. Licensed by Crunchyroll, LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Especially if all the animation you know comes from North American-based creatives (LAIKA, Pixar, DreamWorks, etc.), experiencing Hosoda’s The Boy and the Beast is an opportunity to see another way to do traditional and advanced animation. More importantly, it’s an opportunity to acknowledge that not only are there stories beyond our borders worth seeing, but that not all animation is strictly for young children. Sometimes they’re for mature audiences ready to go on a fantastical adventure that may just heal the hole in your heart.
Re-releasing in theaters on August 18th, 2025 for one night only.
For tickets, head to the official Fandango The Boy and the Beast ticket page.
For more information on the film, head to the official Studio Chizu The Boy and the Beast webpage.
Share this:
Categories: In Theaters, Reviews
Leave a Reply