Poster - Shonen Sarutobe Sasuke

Toei Doga's sophomore feature, Shonen Sarutobe Sasuke, was the first Japanese anime to be shown in the United States.  MGM picked up the rights to this and many other Toei pictures, providing faithful English-language dubs, new titles, and sometimes new songs.  Here are a pair of posters to the MGM version, Magic Boy, for the US and Latin American markets.  These are really enjoyable posters, and the US poster sells for a princely sum these days.  It may not have the pedigree of a Walt Disney, but its place in animation history is secure.  I can't remember who sang the Magic Boy song to save my life.  It was some popular crooner from the '50s...

My favorite poster, of course, remains the Japanese original.  There's something about the design of Japanese movie posters in the 1950s and 1960s, that crowding of image and text, the bold colors, the minor details that require you to examine closely.  Toei is clearly advertising Sasuke as a boys' adventure movie, but the animals are given equal attention on the page.  The adult characters are more to the side, even the villain.  This is really more about having fun and going on exciting adventures than anything.

And is it just me, or is that woman pointing at the kid's butt?  Maybe he should have worn pants.  At least Sasuke doesn't have that creepy Michael Jackson face that you see on the other posters.

Finding the Toei Doga poster is going to be a challenge.  Your best bet is Ebay, and even then, auctions are rare.  If you do find one, expect to pay a princely sum for your bragging rights.  If Toei was smart, they'd sell prints of their classic movie posters.  It's an idea that I always bring up from time to time, and I think it's a good one.  Everyone you went to school with had the same Pulp Fiction poster.  Why not try for something a little different for a change?

Movie - Shonen Sarutobi Sasuke (Magic Boy German Dub)

I managed to find a complete version of Toei Doga's second animated feature, Shonen Sarutobi Sasuke, aka Magic Boy. This is the German dub, which is the only version floating around online at the moment. We'll have to work on that. Someday, we'll get a proper fansubs for all teh classic Toei films. In any event, enjoy the film!

Video - Shonen Sarutobi Sasuke

Shonen Sarutobi Sasuke is Toei's second animation feature film from 1959, and followed on the heels of the great Hakujaden. This was the first movie in a widescreen format, and everything just looks spectacular. I've always loved the colors of the classic Toei films - rich saturations, warm tones, deep and varied. The Studio Ghibli movies, obviously, are a strong parallel, and after you've watched a few Toei movies you can really appreciate that.

This movie was brought to the West under the title, Magic Boy, and this is currently the only version I can find online anywhere. Fortunately, it's available on Youtube right now, in a German dub, but the picture quality looks terrific and it's a joy to watch. You might be shocked at the film's decidedly non-anime look; it's a very "Western"-looking movie, which sometimes works and sometimes doesn't. Surely, the young Toei animators are still learning their craft, still growing, still impressing.

Trailer For Magic Boy (Shonen Sarutobi Sasuke)

Here is the trailer for Toei Doga's second feature film, 1959's Shonen Sarutobi Sasuke, or as it's known in the West, Magic Boy. Ben Ettinger describes:

"Here we find Toei Doga plunging into the realm of the historical fantasy adventure spectacular, and the film is just plain fun to watch, great entertainment with lots of variety and action, but strangely, while it's a step forward from Hakujaden in terms of the animation, it seems to be a step backwards in terms of the content. Apparently this is attributable purely to Toei politics. The original script was transformed at a late stage in production into a simple bad-guy-vs-good-guy story at the behest of Toei execs who wanted to cash in on the popular formula Toei had been putting to use at the time in their live-action jidaigeki movies. There was widespread discontent among the animators because of this."

Embedding was disabled for this clip, so you'll just have to follow the link. Enjoy.