Studio Ghibli Has Officially Reopened for Production on Hayao Miyazaki’s New Movie

The road to Hayao Miyazaki‘s new movie continues to be a slow effort, but each new development is well worth celebrating. The latest news as reported on Studio Ghibli‘s official website is that the company has officially reopened its production department to begin work on Miyazaki’s first feature since 2013. The company stopped production on all features and shorts in August 2013, just after Miyazaki confirmed his retirement. Fortunately, both the filmmaker and studio are back and ready to work.

Additional details on Miyazaki’s new film have not been released. It’s been widely speculated the movie will be a feature adaptation of his first CGI short film, “Boro the Caterpillar,” which was supposed to open at the Studio Ghibli Museum in Tokyo last month but has since been delayed. Longtime Studio Ghibli producer Toshio Suzuki said fans should expect to see the feature sometime in 2019 before Tokyo hosts the 2020 Olympic games.

The studio made headlines earlier this year when they posted an application in May calling for animators who wanted to help work on Miyazaki’s latest. The candidates have been chosen and will begin their training at Studio Ghibli this fall.

Miyazaki has spent much of the year in pre-production on the movie and now it appears production will officially kick off this fall in Tokyo.