The meaning of a movie feature.
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Kirara Mr. Urobuchi is well known for being a movie fan. How does it feel to finally participate in movie production?
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Gen For live production, I imagine movie and television production are very different processes. For an anime production though, the differences between the two are not many. Of course, a movie's production quality will be substantially higher. As a result, I felt rather indifferent. The difficulty from a script writer stand point, was the longer story length compared to a television script, so the plot must able to remain gripping for the audience. Besides this, how to utilize the big screen and surround sound to create an experience largely rests with other production staff.
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Kirara So that's how it is.
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Gen Also, Shinbo taught me this. The experience of watching with others makes television and movie very different. The audience must realize this as well. At the live screening of "Fate/Zero Episode 15" in Seattle, I had a chance to sit with the audience together to watch that TV animation. I definitely got a "watching with so many people together, it really feels like watching a movie" feeling. Because of that, I think watching in a theater will naturally give a whole different flavor.
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Kirara -Indeed, sitting in front of the big screen, while surrounded by other audience and hearing their reactions, the impression will be totally different.
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Gen The last three episodes of Madoka Magica premiered together. I thought that felt like a movie as well. Maybe we can get an effect like that.
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Kirara -It was definitely like that back then. Even though it was past midnight, everyone watched together while glancing at twitter. I can still remember that strong sense of comradery from back then. Not only that, the broadcast finished over a year ago, yet the Madoka-craze has absolutely not die down. Despite how fast anime now tend to depreciate and forgotten.
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Gen For a single cour anime to remain relevant til now, I am extremely pleased. To tell the truth, I myself was also rather surprised. To be involved with a genre that I am not familiar with, I never dared to imagine this level of success.
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Kirara For Mr. Urobuchi, what kind of work is "Madoka Magica"?
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Gen For me personally, not much has changed. This is because "I designed the series concept myself" and "I wrote the finished script myself" - these two points made it a very personal and special. It was my first time of having such a level of creative freedom. The acclaim given to the script, is largely due to all the people that helped build up from that foundation. Because of this, I want to take this moment to tell everyone involved in this project, "we did it." I am very grateful to everyone for creating such a well received work together... Probably this kind of feeling. To be the script writer of this type of work, I feel is a great honor.
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Kirara - Two months from now, the first two compilation movies will be premiering. Does Mr Urobuchi has anything left to tell to our readers?
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Gen Everything has already said, I don't have anymore requests for them.
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Kirara - Any changes or addition to the dialogue?
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Gen Nope.
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Kirara - I heard you visited the voice recording session for the movie re-recording, any thoughts about that?
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Gen Ah, the voice actors' characterizations had become even more superb. That startled me! Everyone wanted to surpass their performance from the TV edition, so more intended in their interpretation... I deeply felt their sincerity. You could feel the tension in the recording studio. The fans of the TV series will be very satisfied just from the new voice acting.
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Kirara - This series brought together many powerful voices, and everyone cared deeply about this work.
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Gen Very grateful for everyone being so deeply invested. That contributed greatly to the quality of this work.
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Kirara -By the way, any thoughts from watching the compilation?
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Gen It made sense, that surprised me (laugh).
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Kirara - Any new discoveries?
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Gen This...Ah, I realized again, "this story went too far" (laugh). The completion of the script had been a long, long time ago, so I felt like appreciating the someone else's work. I even got some "what was the writer thinking?" kind of feeling (laugh). Especially all the melancholy scenes in the first movie, this feeling was particularly intense. However, the second movie end up as a very wholesome story. In any case, I thought the story makes sense even for watching the first time. But you can certainly discover new things by re-watching the TV version after.
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Kirara - Finally, please say something to the fans.
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Gen What becomes of the Madoka Magica franchise after this, how will it develop, is something that even I can't control. Despite this I am extremely grateful of the fan's patience and trust. I may not able to control this story, or perhaps I was never in control it to begin with. It feels much more like watching a daughter growing up (laugh). In the future, I would like to raise a few more of such daughters. Please keep watching.
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