The Children's Voice Dubbing

On October 30 at around 9:30AM, the production staff started to show up at the Studio Mausu in Shinjuku. We will record 10 child voice actors and Ms. Sayaka Hanamura (a teacher’s voice). The voice dubbing is a very important step that of gives a spirit to the movie characters. It’s up to the voice actors and actresses to create the personality of each character.

Mr. Shioya, the sound director, attends today’s recording at the studio to give the children detailed voice-acting instructions depending on the specificificity of each scene.

The movie is greatly affected by the nuance of the characters'lines and the tone of actors'or actresses'voices. While preserving the concept of the movie envisionned by the director, we try to highlight the individuality of each character.

Morning: Voice Dubbing of the main character Akira and his older and younger sisters

Reading the lines ? even only one line ? is not easy. Mr. Shioya gives the children advices on the voice dubbing in these words : "Can you add a hasty touch to the line?" "Please read that one with an air of disappointment".
Director Nishizawa himself also coaches the children : "You read the line a little too energetically, you should tone down your voice a bit." "Take a look at the screen. The character is smiling ? try to read the line mischievously.". In the part where the characters speaks in the Kansai dialect, the staff paid very close attention to the voice actresses so they read the lines with the proper accent.

Afternoon: All of the child actors/actresses gather, bringing excitement to the studio

We have 10 child voice actors/actresses for "JAPAN, Our Homeland". It’s rare to use such a large group of dubbing members in animation. Sometimes 4 or 5 children characters appear on the screen at the same time, talking to one another with a wide variety of conversation styles : at the morning assemblies, playgrounds, classrooms, etc.

Many child voice actors/actresses find the voice dubbing very challenging. Occasionally we give the green light to their acting for one try or two. At other times, the children go through 6 or 7 rehearsals until we are satisfied with their acting, extending the original time schedule.

At around 15:00, when we were starting to see the tired expressions on the children’s faces, one of the children noticed that the voice of Subaru Kimura (as Gon) were sounding a lot like Jaian, one of the characters from the TV animation "Doraemon". "Is he really the voice actor for Jaian?", the children rumored with excitement, blowing away the fatigue. As for Subaru, his voice acting for the bossy character Gon was superb : nothing but his charismatic voice performance can fit perfectly to the thoughtful Gon.

At the audition, Maika Kawaguchi was chosen to voice act Shizu for her characteristic voice, which was exactly what the director wanted the character’s voice to be.

As time passed on, the nervous-looking children gradually broke the ice with friendly conversations. Some started to exchange jokes and sing to themselves. The studio was filled with a cozy and cheerful atmosphere as we got closer to the end of the day.

Naoya Sekine, the voice actor for the main character Akira, was with us all through today’s recording from the beginning (10AM) to the very end. As Akira appears in most of the movie scenes, he dedicated himself to reading many lines for many hours. One of Naoya’s strengths is his cool, clear voice. In "JAPAN, Our Homeland", his calm performance depicted very well Akira’s pure and serious personality.

The children left the studio with polite farewell greetings, not even showing tired faces. Thanks to their energy, today was such a pleasant recording session.