A special screening comes in winter 2018 as the New York-based film distributor GKIDS announces their licensing of the 2016 documentary film, “Never-Ending Man: Hayao Miyazaki”
The documentary features the 2 years of the master animator’s life as he struggles to complete his work on a difficult project after coming out of retirement. It was first released by on NHK TV in Japan and had a debut on the NHK World channel and website with English subtitles in 2017. During the same year in September, Japan Society screened the special in New York.
It was in the program that the Miyazaki made a report of his desire to return to making an anime feature film, after retiring from directing feature films in 2013.
With the documentary, GKIDS describes it as follows:
In 2013, film director and animator Hayao Miyazaki suddenly announced his retirement at the age of 72. But he couldn’t shake his burning desire to create. After an encounter with young CGI animators, Miyazaki embarked on a new endeavor, his first project ever to utilize CGI. But the artist, who had been adamant about hand-drawn animation, confronted many challenges. The film even faces the danger of being canceled. Can an old master who thinks he’s past his prime shine once again? This program goes behind the scenes over two years as Miyazaki overcomes struggles to create his short film using CGI.
GKIDS is an American film distributor based in New York and uses a bespoke distribution method to release critically acclaimed, hand-drawn, international films. It was in 2010 that the company gained prominence by garnering a series of Academy Award nominations for little-known, underdog films, beating out big-budget American films such as “The Lego Movie,” “The Peanuts Movie” and “Finding Dory.” Although the name is said to be an acronym for “Guerrilla Kids International Distribution Syndicate,” the company is commonly referred to only as GKIDS and is legally registered as such in New York state.
Hayao Miyazaki is a name that very little does not know in the anime/manga community. He has attained international acclaim as a masterful storyteller and as a maker of anime feature films and is widely regarded as one of the greatest animation directors.
Source = Crunchyroll News