The Boy and the Beast (2015)
Directed by Mamoru Hosoda
Kyuta, a boy living in Shibuya, and Kumatetsu, a lonesome beast from Jutengai, an imaginary world. One day, Kyuta forays into the imaginary world and, as he's looking for his way back, meets Kumatetsu who becomes his spirit guide. That encounter leads them to many adventures.
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What follows is a mentorship montage 180 degrees removed from “The Karate Kid” or any number of conventional kung-fu character reinventions: Kumatetsu proves to be a disastrous teacher, losing his temper at the slightest provocation, while Kyuta actually manages to outsmart his mentor, getting the better of the cranky old bear in a series of amusing scenes that compress eight years of rigorous training and personal evolution into a rowdy bonding experience.
Hosoda, who was briefly and ill-fatedly connected with Miyazaki's Studio Ghibli a decade ago before branching out with his own organization, delivers a raucously entertaining if slightly overlong romp which borrows liberally from existing sources — it's at heart a Harry Potter-flavored fusion of The Jungle Book and The Karate Kid — but has more than enough character and brio to stand foursquare on its own two hairy feet.
While Studio Ghibli maestro Hayao Miyazaki shifts his attention to CG and short-form toons, Hosoda (who’d been attached to direct “Howl’s Moving Castle” at an early stage) nobly forges ahead with the labor-intensive art of hand-drawn animation, serving up an action-packed buddy movie that strategically combines several of Japanese fans’ favorite ingredients: conflicted teens, supernatural creatures and epic battles.
Japanese productions have landed Best Animated Feature nominations in each of the last two years via Ghibli's pair The Wind Rises and The Tale of Princess Kaguya , and while The Boy and the Beast is a more conventional affair than either, it is also a more accessible and commercial prospect.