The Time Traveler (film)

Time Traveler (タイムトラベラー, Taimutoraberā) is a 2005 Japanese anime romance drama science fiction film directed by Gorō Taniguchi and based on the 1997 manga series by Ryotaro Sekizawa, who also co-wrote the screenplay with Ichirō Ōkouchi. The film is about a seventeen year boy named Shou Arakaki, who one day, meets a girl who appeared in a ball of light named Naomi Azuma, who was sent from the future to his time period to protect him, for his destiny is something that will change human history for the better, and it's something another man from the future named Jurou Makino wants to prevent from happening.

Time Traveler was one of the first new anime adaptations of a Ryotaro Sekizawa manga following the successes of Teen Samurai and the Blue Blanket trilogy. Produced by Sunrise, the film was released in Japan by Shochiku on June 18, 2005, where it received positive reviews from critics and grossed ¥1.5 billion at the Japanese box office. The film also received a limited theatrical release in the United States, where it grossed $5.3 million. It overperformed in the American home video market, generating more than $12.8 million in home video sales.

Plot
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Release
Time Traveler initially premiered in a small amount of theaters in Japan on June 18, 2005, with Shochiku handling the distribution. Following it's successful opening then, it's release would be expanded to additional theaters on July 2.

Likely as a result of the success of The Blue Blanket 's US theatrical release, Time Traveler attracted the attention of Warner Bros. Pictures' indie film subsidiary Warner Independent Pictures, who paid $6 million to acquire the distribution rights for the film in the United States and the United Kingdom. The film had a special screening at Anime Vegas in the Cashman Center in Las Vegas, Nevada on October 29, 2005, and on May 26, 2006, an English dub of the film entered a limited theatrical release in the United States across 6 theaters in New York and Los Angeles. It would later expand to 223 theaters on June 2. The UK release followed on June 9, being released in 120 theaters across Britain.

Home media
Bandai Visual released Time Traveler on DVD in Japan as both a standard edition and a limited collector's edition on March 17, 2006. The limited collector's edition featured a copy the movie version of the manga, alongside memorabilia including collectible cards, a booklet featuring character designs and storyboards, and a reel containing five random stills from the feature film, while bonus features on both DVD editions include audio commentaries, behind the scenes featurettes, an interview with Ryotaro Sekizawa, production drawings, and storyboard to scene comparisons. By May of 2009, the film had sold 3 million DVD units in Japan. A Blu-ray edition was released in Japan on August 8, 2008.

Warner Home Video released the film on DVD in the United States on August 8, 2006. In addition to most of the bonus features from the Japanese DVD release, there is also a featurette on the English dub's production, a different audio commentary from that of the Japanese DVD release and the Looney Tunes cartoon Robot Rabbit.