BLEACH

Japan’s Favorite Orange-Haired Teen Hero Leaps into Live Action

Venue(s): Toho Cinemas Roppongi Hills
From July 20, 2018
Language: Japanese with English subtitles
Official website: wwws.warnerbros.co.jp/bleach-movie/
Theater website: hlo.tohotheater.jp/net/schedule/009/TNPI2000J01.do
Trailer: https://youtu.be/dttCkYDmmok

(BLEACH)
Director: Shinsuke Sato (佐藤信介)
Duration: 108 min

Japan’s two hottest young actors star together for the second time (after Takashi Miike’s Blade of the Immortal) in the first live-action adaptation of the popular manga/TV anime/game Bleach, and Warner Bros. continues its laudable tradition of screening its local productions with English subs at Toho Cinemas Roppongi.

Even if you’re not a fan of Tite Kubo’s original — which ran in Weekly Shonen Jump from 2001-2016, with 74 total volumes and over 90 million copies sold worldwide — staggeringly talented director Shinsuke Sato (I Am a Hero, Death Note: Light Up the World) is at the helm of this adaptation, and you’re sure to find plenty of interest (for us, Miyavi topped that list, with incredible insouciance and impressive hairstyling).

Sota Fukushi (Strobe Edge, Laughing Under the Clouds, Blade of the Immortal) is high school boy Ichigo Kurosaki, who seems quite normal except for his orange hair, and the little fact that he can see ghosts. He lives with his dad and two younger sisters in a suburban town, and is still tortured by his mom’s mysterious death when he was 5, which occurred just moments after he’d promised to protect her forever.

Ichigo’s life is turned upside down when a black-kimono’ed girl appears suddenly in his bedroom one night, introducing herself as Rukia Kuchiki (Hana Sugisaki of Piéta in the Toilet, Blade of the Immortal). She then proceeds to wield her enormous sword against a gigantic evil monster that begins attacking Ichigo’s family.

Ichigo learns that Rukia is a Shinigami (Soul Reaper), a type of immortal whose job is to send Plus ghosts to the afterlife and to slay the human soul-sucking spirits called Hollows. She does this with an enormous Zanpakuto, a huge, broad-bladed katana that can blast energy flashes. Rukia fights the Hollow valiantly but is badly injured. She begs Ichigo to help by becoming a Substitute Shinigami, and they transfer her powers to him just in time to save his family.But complications await, as they always do. Now stuck in the earthly realm until she recovers, Rukia takes up residency in Ichigo’s closet and starts training him in Zanpakuto fighting techniques in the park (as various high school friends look on in astonishment). This angers Ichigo’s classmate, Uryū Ishida (Ryo Yoshizawa of River’s Edge) the last surviving member of a clan of mystical archers who are sworn enemies of the Shinigami. Worse, Hana’s transferal of powers to Ichigo, a mere human, has incited the wrath of her older brother, Soul Society Capt. Byakuya Kuchiki (Unbroken’s Miyavi) and his devoted lieutenant, Renji Arabai (Taichi Saotome of Crows Explode)…

Bleach is rumored to be the beginning of a trilogy, so brush up on your manga lore and don’t miss all the excitement!

Photos: ©久保帯人／集英社 ©2018映画「BLEACH」製作委員会

 

Toho Cinemas Roppongi