The Japan Society revealed on Monday that it will host the United States premiere of the live-action Bleach film on July 28 as part of JAPAN CUTS: Festival of New Japanese Film. Director Shinsuke Satō will appear at the screening to introduce the film and participate in a Q&A. The event will also host the East Coast premiere of Masaaki Yuasa 's Night is Short, Walk On Girl anime film on July 21.

Other guests at the event will include actors Kirin Kiki , Shunsuke Kubozuka , and Takumi Saitoh, as well as directors Eric Khoo and Keisuke Yoshida .

The live-action film of Tite Kubo 's Bleach manga will open in Japan on July 20. Sato (live-action Gantz , Gantz II: Perfect Answer films, Oblivion Island anime film) is directing the film.

The story will center on the "Substitute Shinigami Arc," the manga's first arc which ran from its first to eighth volume.

Night is Short, Walk On Girl opened in Japan last April. The film adapts Tomihiko Morimi 's ( The Eccentric Family , The Tatami Galaxy ) novel of the same name. The story takes place in Kyoto, and follows an upperclassman (" Sempai ") who falls in love with his underclassman ("Girl with Black Hair") and tries to get her attention.

The film won the Grand Prize for Features award at the Ottawa International Film Festival last September and the Animation of the Year award at the 41st annual Japan Academy Prizes in March.

GKIDS licensed the film and plans to release it this fall.

Source: Japan Society