IWAKI, Fukushima Prefecture--This disaster-hit city serves as the backdrop for the latest offering by anime film director Yutaka Yamamoto.
"Twilight," the final installment in his Tohoku trilogy set in the northeastern region, is a love story between senior high school students just after the 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake and tsunami.
It is now on national release.
Yamamoto's anime projects are aimed at helping reconstruction efforts by luring tourists to affected areas.
“Twilight” features familiar landscapes and locations in Iwaki, including idyllically sprawling rice fields, a slope leading to a senior high school, Iwaki and Kusano stations, a bus stop and a cafe.
The glittering sunset over the landscape is beautifully portrayed.
The story centers around Sachi, who is busy with violin practice for her high school music club. Yusuke, who attends another senior high school, having evacuated to Iwaki due to the nuclear disaster triggered by the quake and tsunami, is working on a drawing of a sunset he is planning to submit to an exhibition.
They meet at a bus stop in a countryside and are drawn to each other.
Yamamoto, who wrote the screenplay, liked the landscape he found in Iwaki and decided to set the story there.
“I want to depict the beautiful landscapes not only to people in Fukushima (Prefecture) but also to people around the world,” Yamamoto said at a news conference here. “Living a normal life and falling in love. It is wonderful to be able to live normal lives.”
In recent years, die-hard fans seek out real-life locations featured in their favorite movies, anime titles and other works as part of their “seichi junrei” pilgrimages.
“If you connect some places in the movie, you can organize a ‘Twilight tour.’ I want to help reconstruction efforts by encouraging people to go on a pilgrimage after they see the movie,” the director said.
The heroine was played by Hiyori Sakurada, an up-and-coming actress who made her voice acting debut with “Twilight.”
“Sachi is about the same age as me. I hope teenagers also see it,” she said during the news conference. “I’d be happy if people are motivated to visit there and see the places with their own eyes.”
Other offering in Yamamoto’s Tohoku trilogy are “blossom” set in Iwate Prefecture and “Wake Up, Girls!” The latter is set in Sendai.