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New UK Home Editions of Devilman Crybaby and Godzilla Minus One Listed on Amazon
posted on by Andrew Osmond
Amazon UK is listing a standard UK Blu-ray edition of DEVILMAN crybaby, the 2018 Netflix series directed by Masaaki Yuasa and animated by Science SARU anime, as being released on September 21. The company describes the story:
"Devils cannot take form without a living host. However, if the will of an individual is strong enough, they can overcome the demon and make its power their own, becoming a Devilman."Weak and unassuming, Akira Fudou has always had a bleeding heart. So when his childhood friend Ryō Asuka asks for his help in uncovering devils, Akira accepts without hesitation. However, to Akira's surprise, the place they go to is Sabbath: an immoral party of debauchery and degeneracy. Amidst bloodshed and death, demons possess the partiers, turning their bodies into grotesque monsters, and begin wreaking havoc. In a reckless attempt to save his best friend, Akira unwittingly merges with the devil Amon and becomes a Devilman, gaining the power to defeat the remaining demons.
"Though it grants him great power, this new partnership awakens an insatiable and primeval part of Akira. Having the body of a devil but the same crybaby heart, Akira works alongside Ryou, destroying those that harm humanity and his loved ones."
The DEVILMAN crybaby anime premiered worldwide on Netflix in January 2018. The project marked Gō Nagai's 50th anniversary as a creator.
Nagai launched the original Devilman manga in Kodansha's Weekly Shōnen Magazine in 1972. A television anime adaptation of the manga aired simultaneously that year. The anime and manga series have spawned more than a dozen different spinoffs, crossovers, and remakes since 1972, including manga, OVAs, and a 2004 live-action film. Seven Seas Entertainment will release the original manga in English.
This edition is described as carrying the film on 4K UHD Blu-ray and on standard Blu-ray. It will also contain the black-and-white version of the film, entitled Godzilla Minus One/Minus Colour. It will also contain a "making of" feature, a "making of VFX" featurette, a behind-the-scenes program, plus event footage and trailers.
Godzilla Minus One (the colour version) opened in Japan on November 3, 2023 ("Godzilla Day"), which was the anniversary of the first Godzilla film's November 3, 1954 release. The new film screened at The Tokyo International Film Festival (TIFF) as the closing film of this year's event on November 1.
The film sold 648,600 tickets for 1,041,193,460 yen (about US$6.93 million) in its first three days in the Japanese box office. The film sold 14.7% more tickets and earned 22.8% more in its first three days than the last live-action Japanese Godzilla film, Hideaki Anno and Shinji Higuchi's Shin Godzilla, did in its first three days in 2016. The film has sold a total of 2.87 million tickets for a cumulative total of 4,425,512,980 yen (about US$31.04 million).
Ryūnosuke Kamiki plays protagonist Kōichi Shikishima, and Minami Hamabe plays heroine Noriko Ōishi. (The two also lead the cast of NHK's ongoing weekday morning series Ranman.) Other cast members include Yuki Yamada, Munetaka Aoki, Hidetaka Yoshioka, Sakura Andō, and Kuranosuke Sasaki.
The film opened in U.S. theaters on December 1, and earned US$11,419,975 in its first three days to rank #3 in the U.S. box office in its opening weekend. The film has the highest opening weekend for a foreign film in the United States this year, surpassing the US$10.1 million opening weekend earnings of Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba Swordsmith Village Arc in March. The film has become the highest-earning live-action Japanese film in North America. The Critics Choice Award has nominated the film for Best Foreign Language Film.
Yamazaki is the director and writer, and is also credited for visual effects. Yamazaki has primarily directed live-action films, including the Always: Sunset on Third Street, Returner, and Parasyte films, but has also directed CG films such as Stand By Me Doraemon.
