The Life of Guskou Budori (Guskou Budori no Denki) is a 2012 anime movie directed by Gisaburou Sugii, based on the Japanese fairy tale of the same name by Kenji Miyazawa. There is also an earlier and more obscure 1994 movie adaptation of the same Miyazawa story by Bandai Visual, though this page is primarily not about that one. The 2012 remake turns the humans into cats, with the same designs as in Night on the Galactic Railroad, an earlier work based on another Miyazawa fairy tale by the same director.
Guskou is a cat who lives in the Tohoku forests in northeastern Japan in the 1920s. A series of droughts and natural disasters forces Guskou to leave home and search for a new place to live.
He soon falls in with a group of scientists at the Ihatov Volcano Department and discovers that they are dealing with the same natural disasters that have altered Guskou’s life.
The trailer can be seen here
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This movie contains examples of:
- Anthropomorphic Animal Adaptation: Like in Night On The Galactic Railroad, the humans have been replaced with cats.
- Cat Folk: The main characters of the movie are all anthropomorphic cats.
- Chekhov's Volcano: Guskou is approached by scientists to research a volcano, and decides to stop the storm, he must make it erupt.
- Global Warming: A series of droughts and a huge winter storm leave the villagers hungry and desperate, and Guskou to find a new home.
- Magical Realism: Every now and again Guskou will enter the Otherworld after passing out or falling asleep.
- Scenery Porn: This movie is pretty, as evidenced by the trailer.
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Spiritual Successor: To Gisaburou's first animated, anthropomorphic cat-having adaption of a Miyazawa novel, Night on the Galactic Railroad.
