A live-action film adaptation of Makoto Shinkai’s 2007 anime film 5 Centimeters per Second is set to release in Japan in the fall of 2025. The film’s official website opened and revealed the news today.As the third original anime film work by Shinkai following Voices of a Distant Star (2002) and The Place Promised in Our Early Days (2004), 5 Centimeters per Second was released in Japan on March 3, 2007. Comix Wave Film’s official website describes the synopsis as below:
After transferring to the same elementary school, Takaki and Akari became best friends.However, their lives change when the families of both are forced to relocate. After a year of separation, Takaki is about to reunite with Akari. As he sits on the train from Tokyo, memories of the past rush through Takaki’s head, his meeting time with Akari drawing ever closer. Takaki and Akari begin to wonder if they will ever be able to see each other again, and share their secret feelings. Join Takaki on a journey into three interconnected tales of love and lost innocence that span the minutes and months of their lives.
This is the first time that a live-action film adaptation of Shinkai’s anime work has ever been released. Yoshiyuki Okuyama, known for his music video works for Kenshi Yonezu (“Kanden,” “KICK BACK”), serves as director on a screenplay by Ayako Suzuki. “I feel that it is an important coincidence that I, at the age of 33, am being asked to film a story that Makoto Shinkai-san was weaving when he was 33 years old at the time, even though it is just a number,” said Okuyama. “Every day I face ‘5 Centimeters per Second’ with the realization that there are things that can only be created now, and that there is a gaze that will eventually be forgotten.”Meanwhile, Hokuto Matsumura, a 29-year-old member of STARTO ENTERTAINMENT’s male idol group SixTONES, is cast as the role of the male protagonist, Takaki Tono. He previously voiced Souta Munakata, one of the main characters in Shinkai’s 2022 anime film, Suzume.
Hokuto Matsumura
The original anime film’s running time is 63 minutes. It depicts the protagonist’s time as an elementary and junior high school student, high school student, and company employee in a series of three short stories. The live-action adaptaion will be a two-hour feature film based on a screenplay that was created through discussions with the original creator, Shinkai.Shinkai wrote on his official X (formerly Twitter): “A live-action film adaptation of ‘5 Centimeters per Second’ has been announced. I am truly grateful to director Okuyama, Hokuto-kun, and the rest of the young team for giving new life to this old and poor (but favorite in my own way) work. I am also so motivated that I must make an anime film that can live up to their enthusiasm and talent. I am very much looking forward to seeing the new ‘5 Centimeters per Second’ in a theater!”
Sources: “5 Centimeters per Second” live-action film official website, Makoto Shinkai official X (formerly Twitter), Eiga.com©2025 “5 Centimeters per Second” Production Committee
©Makoto Shinkai/ CoMix Wave Films
