''The Wonderland'', known in Japan and the UK as , is a 2019 Japanese animated

coming-of-age Coming of age is a young person's transition from being a child to being an adult. The specific age at which this transition takes place varies between societies, as does the nature of the change. It can be a simple legal convention or can ...

fantasy Fantasy is a genre of speculative fiction involving Magic (supernatural), magical elements, typically set in a fictional universe and sometimes inspired by mythology and folklore. Its roots are in oral traditions, which then became fantasy ...

adventure film An adventure film is a form of adventure fiction, and is a genre of film. Subgenres of adventure films include swashbuckler films, pirate films, and survival films. Adventure films may also be combined with other film genres such as action, an ...

directed by

Keiichi Hara is a Japanese director of animated films. Biography What started Hara on his career as an animation creator was visiting an animation film company as part of his job hunting activities after graduating from Tokyo Designer Gakuin College (TDG). H ...

. Based on the 1988

children's story "Children's Story" is a song recorded by British-American hip hop artist Slick Rick. Taken as the second single from his album ''The Great Adventures of Slick Rick'', the song was a Top 5 hit on both the Hot R&B Singles and the Hot Rap Tracks ...

''Chikashitsu Kara no Fushigi na Tabi'' (''Strange Journey from the Basement'') by Sachiko Kashiwaba, it stars

Mayu Matsuoka is a Japanese actress. She has been awarded the Tama best Emerging Actress Award and Fumiko Yamaji Freshman Actress Award in 2016. She gained international attention as an ambassador of the Tokyo International Film Festival for 2017 and her rol ...

Anne Watanabe is a Japanese fashion model, actress, and singer. She is the daughter of film actor Ken Watanabe and his first wife Yumiko. In her modeling work, she is known by the mononym Anne.Kuhn, Anthony"For Japanese Women, The Past Is The Latest Fad"/ref> ...

and

Kumiko Aso , better known by her stage name , is a Japanese actress. She is also a model and has participated in several commercials. Career In 1995, Asō made her film debut in ''Bad Guy Beach''. With her role in the 1998 film ''Dr. Akagi'', she received ...

. The characters were designed by

Ilya Kuvshinov Ilya Kuvshinov (born 20 February 1990) is a Russian illustrator who created the character designs for '' Ghost in the Shell: SAC 2045'' and ''The Wonderland'' (2019). Early life He is popular on Instagram, where he had 2 million followers as o ...

. It premiered in Japan on April 26, 2019, and was screened in competition at the

Annecy International Animation Film Festival The Annecy International Animation Film Festival (french: Festival international du film d'animation d'Annecy, officially abbreviated in English as the Annecy Festival, or simply Annecy) was created in 1960 and takes place at the beginning of J ...

in June 2019. It was the final Japanese film to be released in the

Heisei The is the period of Japanese history corresponding to the reign of Emperor Emeritus Akihito from 8 January 1989 until his abdication on 30 April 2019. The Heisei era started on 8 January 1989, the day after the death of the Emperor Hirohito, ...

era, five days before the

2019 Japanese imperial transition The 2019 Japanese imperial transition occurred on 30 April 2019 when the then 85-year-old Emperor Akihito of Japan abdicated from the Chrysanthemum Throne after reigning for 30 years, becoming the first Emperor of Japan to do so since 1817. Th ...

Voice cast

as Akane *

as Chii *

as Midori *

Nao Tōyama is a Japanese voice actress and singer affiliated with the agency Intention. Before joining Intention, she was affiliated with Arts Vision. She debuted as a voice actress in 2010, and played her first leading role as Kanon Nakagawa in ''The Worl ...

as Pipo *

Keiji Fujiwara was a Japanese actor and voice actor. His best known works are voicing Shinnosuke's father Hiroshi Nohara in the long-running anime series '' Crayon Shin-chan'', Maes Hughes in ''Fullmetal Alchemist'', Holland in ''Eureka Seven'', Axel in '' K ...

as Zan Gu *

Akiko Yajima is a Japanese voice actress from Kashiwazaki, Niigata. Her best-known role is as the title character Shinnosuke Nohara in the long-running anime series '' Crayon Shin-chan''. She also voices Mipple in the original ''Futari wa Pretty Cure'', S ...

as Doropo

English voice cast

* Lisa Reimold as Akane * Allegra Clark as Chii * TBA as Midori * Jackie Lastra as Pipo * Ben Lepley as Zan Gu * Jennifer Losi as Doropo *

Zach Aguilar Zachary Aguilar (born February 21, 1998) is an American voice actor who has appeared in various English dubbed versions of Japanese anime and video games, working for Bang! Zoom Entertainment, Viz Media and Funimation. Aguilar's first major r ...

as Prince * Frank Todaro as Hippocrates

Release and reception

Matt Schley of ''

The Japan Times ''The Japan Times'' is Japan's largest and oldest English-language daily newspaper. It is published by , a subsidiary of News2u Holdings, Inc.. It is headquartered in the in Kioicho, Chiyoda, Tokyo. History ''The Japan Times'' was launched by ...

'' gave the film 3 out of 5 stars, praising the animation and visuals but suggesting it as being among a number of anime films "trying to recreate the charms of Miyazaki". He concluded: "''The Wonderland'' is not the first, and will almost definitely not be the last, to try to push the Miyazaki buttons — and while it succeeds on the surface, it lacks the deeper emotional core to make for something truly wondrous." Allan Hunter of ''

Screen Daily ''Screen International'' is a British film magazine covering the international film business. It is published by Media Business Insight, a British B2B media company. The magazine is primarily aimed at those involved in the global film business. ...

'' wrote that the "overly busy story provides countless opportunities to create imaginative worlds and strange characters, but it also tends to feel like a string of

set piece In film production, a set piece is a scene or sequence of scenes whose execution requires complex logistical planning and considerable expenditure of money. The term is often also used more broadly to describe a sequence in which the film-maker's ...

s rather than something that builds dramatic tension or momentum", feeling that "a less elaborate approach might have achieved more of an emotional impact." While noting the film's shortcomings, Twwk of ''Beneath the Tangles'' also wrote, "I could appreciate the direction, which sometimes created an intensity and urgency that made me worry for the characters, and the abounding fantasy which reminded me that I, too, had an imagination once." US and Canada disc releases were available from

Shout Factory Shout! Factory is an American home video and music company founded in 2002 as Retropolis Entertainment. Its video releases include previously released feature films, classic and contemporary television series, animation, live music, and comedy ...

in 2020-10-06.The Wonderland (DVD)
/ref>

References

External links

Warner Bros. siteEleven Arts site
* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Wonderland, The 2019 films 2019 anime films Coming-of-age anime and manga Fantasy anime and manga Japanese fantasy adventure films Films directed by Keiichi Hara Warner Bros. films