Gkids is set to release “100 Meters” (“Hyakuemu”) by Iwashima Kenji. It will be released in Los Angeles on October 10th in both the original Japanese and the new English-covered version, with a nationwide event being released on October 12th. The film will be released domestically in Japan on September 19th.
Based on the beloved comic by Uoto, author of “Orb: On the Movements of the Earth,” “100 Meter” was first announced at last year’s Annecy International Animation Film Festival. The film continued its world premiere as an official choice at the 2025 Annessy International Animation Film Festival.
It follows Taishi, a truck star born to run. According to Logline, rogashi is naturally talented and wins every 100-meter race without effort. However, in the sixth grade he meets Komiya, a forwarding student who is full of resolve but has no technique. In teaching him, Tomon gives Komiya a new purpose: to win no matter what. As the years pass, Senzoku and Komiya meet again as rivals on the truck, revealing their true selves.
Iwasaki will be joined by character designer and executive animation director Kojima Keisuke and art director Yamaguchi. The script is written by Yasuyuki Muto (“Mobile Suit Gundam: Hathaway”, “Tokyo Revengers”) and the score is composed by Hiroaki Tsutsumi (“Jujutsu Kaisen”, “Tokyo Revengers”, “Dr. Stone”). The project is produced by Pony Canyon, Tokyo Broadcasting System (TBS) and Asmik Ace.
This marks the second collaboration between Gkids and Ywaisawa.
Speaking of diverse films, Iwasaki said: “What captivated me the most was called a genius and while I grew up, I felt the limits of my talent, but I have overcome obstacles and comebacks.
Visually, he said, “I want to make the characters as realistic as possible and capture the atmosphere of Uoto-Sensei’s original comics.”
Iwasaki became famous after his debut film, “On-Gaku: Our Sound.” Gkids has distributed the film. It consisted of over 40,000 hand-drawn frames using rotoscope animation technology. It won the best independent animation feature at the Annie Awards.
The filmmaker once again used rotoscopes with this feature, saying, “I have a bigger team with a lot of professional staff I’m sophisticated to make rotoscope techniques more efficient and improve quality.”
Please see the trailer below.
