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Giveaway: Win a Free Blu-ray & Gift Set of Production I.G’s ‘Miss Hokusai’

Critically acclaimed 2D animated feature from multi-award winning director Keiichi Hara and Production I.G, the production company behind ‘Ghost in the Shell,’ now available on Blu-ray and DVD.

In celebration of Tuesday's Blu-ray + DVD release of Production I.G’s Miss Hokusai, GKIDS is giving one lucky AWN reader their very own copy of the gorgeous coming-of-age tale by award-winning director Keiichi Hara along with a gift pack that includes Great Wave-patterned socks, folding fan, bookmark, journal and green tea chocolate bar.

From the creative forces behind Ghost in the Shell and A Letter to Momo, Miss Hokusai took home the Jury Prize at this year’s prestigious Annecy Film Festival, swept the top jury and audience awards at Fantasia Film Festival, and won Best Animated Feature at both Sitges and the Asia Pacifica Screen Awards, among others.

Adapted from Hinako Sugiura’s manga Sarusuberi, by Miho Maruo, Miss Hokusai is the untold story of O-Ei, the daughter and artistic collaborator of Katsushika Hokusai, arguably Japan’s greatest artist.

Katsuhiko Hokusai was a prolific illustrator and printmaker, best known for the woodblock print series Thirty-six Views of Mount Fuji, which includes the famous and widely produced, The Great Wave off Kanagawa. Hokusai is also known for his erotic illustrations, called shunga, of which is The Dream of the Fisherman’s Wife is perhaps the most well-known in the west. Late in his career, Hokusai published a series of pamphlets and art manuals, referred to as “Hokusai’s manga,” with sketches and humorous caricatures that influenced the modern form of comics known by the same name, as well as the stylized characters in Japanese animation. Hokusai’s works can be seen as part of permanent collections at The Met, LACMA, Boston MFA, and other top museums worldwide.

Set in Edo period Japan, the film portrays O-Ei’s coming of age as a young woman, as she struggles with her identity as an artist, her emerging sexuality, and the search for the sublime through art.

Here’s the official synopsis:

As all of Edo flocks to see the work of the famous painter Hokusai, his daughter O-Ei toils diligently inside his studio, unknown to the public. Her masterful portraits, dragons and erotic sketches – sold under the name of her father – are coveted by upper crust Lords and journeyman print makers alike. In public, O-Ei knows and respects “her place,” but at home in the studio, she’s as brash and uninhibited as her father, smoking a pipe while sketching erotic drawings that would make contemporary Japanese ladies blush. But despite her talent and fiercely independent spirit, O-Ei struggles under the domineering influence of her father and is ridiculed for lacking the life experience that she is attempting to portray in her art. MISS HOKUSAI’s lively Edo (present day Tokyo) is filled with yokai spirits, dragons, and conniving tradesmen, while O-Ei’s relationships with her famously impetuous father and blind younger sister provide a powerful emotional underpinning to this rollicking and sumptuously-animated feminist coming-of-age tale.

To enter your chance to win a Blu-ray + DVD + Digital HD copy of Miss Hokusai, along with a nifty gift pack, email info@awn.com with the subject heading “Miss Hokusai Giveaway” with your full name and mailing address. One lucky winner (Sorry folks, U.S. residents only! And it’s not because we don’t love our international readers; it’s because GKIDS doesn’t have distribution rights outside the U.S.) will be chosen at random, and will be notified via email. The deadline for entries is 5:00PM Pacific on Tuesday, March 14.

Jennifer Wolfe's picture

Formerly Editor-in-Chief of Animation World Network, Jennifer Wolfe has worked in the Media & Entertainment industry as a writer and PR professional since 2003.