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Column by Scott Green

Production I.G has announced that Mamoru Oshii, best known internationally for the two Ghost in the Shell movies, will direct The Sky Crawlers, an animated feature scheduled for Japanese release in 2008.

The Sky Crawlers is based on series of novels by Hiroshi Mori concerning an alternate present day where young "Kildren" fight a war as entertainment for adults. After reading the novel, Director Oshii praised it as "a work that should be made into a movie for young people now....It is time to face this new perception to our existence through the Kildren, who live indefinitely in eternal adolescence, and this theme should be dealt with now."

Oshii's previous project was Tachigui: The Amazing Lives of the Fast Food Grifters, a mockumentary looking at the history of dine-and-dash con artists since World War II. Tachigui was filmed through the "Superlivemation" process of animating photographs.

MAIN STAFF
Based on the novel by Hiroshi Mori (published in Japan by Chuokoron-Shinsha)
Screenplay: Chihiro Ito
Music: Kenji Kawai
Executive Producers: Seiji Okuda, Mitsuhisa Ishikawa
Producer: Tomohiko Ishii
Director: Mamoru Oshii
Sequence Director: Toshihiko Nishikubo
Character Designer/Key Animation Director: Tetsuya Nishio
Mechanical Designer: Atsushi Takeuchi
Art Director: Kazuo Nagai
Art Settings: Takashi Watabe
Color Designer: Kumiko Yusa
Visual Effects: Hisashi Ezura
CGI Supervisor: Hiroyuki Hayashi
Line Producer: Toru Kawaguchi
Animation Production: Production I.G
Distribution in Japan: Warner Entertainment Japan