Every day that goes by without an announcement of a Honey, I Shrunk the Kids (IN THREE FUCKING DEES!!!!) remake shocks me. Perhaps The Borrower Arrietty, the next film to come out of Studio Ghibli, will find success and the studios will decide on the classier, more literary property from which to base a pandering movie about small-as-hells.

While The Borrower Arrietty isn’t actually a Miyazaki-directed piece, fans will be happy to know he’s watched over it closely as the writer, and a production supervisor/developer. Hiromasa Yonebayashi, key animator of Spirited Away, Howl’s Moving Castle, and Ponyo who started with the studio on Princess Mononoke, directed the film based on Mary Norton’s classic The Borrowers (which has been brought to the screen many times since its publication in 1952).

The film will cover the adventures of a group of minuscule people called “borrowers” who live beneath the floorboard of normal-sized humans. It appears the film has been illustrated with the typical beauty and grace of a Ghibli product- the only mystery is if Yonebayashi’s directorial hand is as sure as Miyazaki’s.

Below are two clips/teases of the film, which will hit theaters in Japan on July 17th. Presumably an announcement of some kind of stateside release will come in the next few months, so fans should keep their eyes peeled.

(source | i09)

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