Attack predicted to be a big hit

MANILA, Philippines - Toho’s Attack on Titan (AOT) opened colossally in Japan over the weekend; according to the distributor, AOT’s opening is 94 percent higher than Toho’s other popular franchise Godzilla, which was released in 2014 by Warner Bros. worldwide. The box-office for the first part of Attack on Titan is now expected to have gross $45M at the Japanese box-office.

Attack on Titan is predicted to surpass another huge manga-to-movie franchise, Rurouni Kenshin, in Japan, which has a $36M final box-office in 2012.

When the serialization of Isayama Hajime’s manga Shingeki no Kyojin (Attack on Titan) began in 2009, its outlandish premise terrified readers with its innovative approach to horror. Since then, over 50 million copies have been published around the world. The book was later turned into a hugely popular animé series that is found a strong fandom even here in the Philippines.

On Aug. 12, a live-action film adaptation directed by Shinji Higuchi, who has blended Japanese tokusatsu-style physical special effects of the kind developed in movies such as the Godzilla series with the latest CGI technology, brings its nightmarish vision to the screen with even more visceral and powerful imagery.

Prior to its Japanese release, the first of its two parts, Shingeki no Kyojin: Attack on Titan, received its world premiere in Los Angeles in front of a demanding Hollywood audience.

Adapting a beloved character comes with a large weight of responsibility, and for Haruma Miura, playing the popular Eren meant living up to the highest of high expectations. “It was a huge amount of pressure, but if you’re working in what kind of circumstance there’s a lot to learn, so I learned a lot in the process,” he said.

Based on the audience’s reaction, Miura more than satisfied fan expectations, garnering rousing cheers throughout the screening. Similar to the manga it was based on, the film explores a post-apocalyptic society devastated by a race of giants known as Titans. Confined within three concentric walls, hundred of feet high, Eren Yeager, Mikasa Acherman (Kiko Mizuhara) and countless others spend their day-to-day lives in paradise of mankind’s making, protected from the looming dangers of the outside world.

Without a single disturbance in nearly 100 years, the Titans have become all but myths, until a Titan larger than any seen before tears down a portion of a wall, allowing numerous others to invade and terrorize the last of the human race. Unable to defend themselves, hundreds are literally lifted into the air and devoured by the giants. Eventually, the destructions ends, the remaining few rebuild and confine themselves within a much smaller territory. But a plan of attack is needed, and Eren and Mikasa could be humanity’s last hope for survival.

The filmmaking is fantastic. Higuchi wisely combined CGI effects and practical effects throughout the film.