HIDARI (2023)

I can say with great confidence that this is simply the dopest thing you’ll see today.

HIDARI is a short film made as a “pilot” for a feature length version. It’s a stop-motion movie that tells the legend of Hidari Jingorō. This thing is ridiculously incredible on a pure technical level, but it also has so much propulsive action and inventive set-ups that it truly engages its audience.

Here’s what the filmmakers have to say about the project:

After being betrayed by his peers and lost both his father and his right arm, legendary craftsman "Jingoro Hidari" is on a journey of revenge with his partner "Sleeping Cat" and his mechanical prosthetic arm. Finally, Jingoro faces one of his adversaries "Inumaru" in a fight to the death...

This is a pilot version of the stop-motion samurai film that tells the story of "Jingoro Hidari," a legendary Edo-era craftsman. All the characters are made by wood and animated frame by frame, just like how Jingoro's wooden sculptures came to life in his many anecdotes. We hope you enjoy this film, which mixes dynamic actions as seen in Japanimation, and the rich analog expressions of stop-motion animation.

Our intention is to use this pilot film as a starting point to create a full length feature film. We're currently running a crowdfunding campaign on Kickstarter to gain support for our activities to find the necessary partners to go into production of the feature-length version. If you liked this video and would want to see more of it, we would be very grateful if you can support us on Kickstarter!

For those that do not speak Japanese (like myself), be sure to turn on the English captions via the CC button on the bottom of the video.

I cannot stress enough just how cool HIDARI is—it is more than deserving of six minutes of your time. You can support the feature film on Kickstarter, follow the project on Twitter and on Instagram.