Home / News Articles / Movie 20 Website Updates with Report from the Movie's World Premiere at Japan Expo Paris 2017
The official Pokémon movie website has updated. Translations follow:

The World Premiere Took Place at "Japan Expo Paris 2017" in Paris, France!




The world premiere of "Pocket Monsters the Movie: I Choose You!" took place at "Japan Expo Paris 2017",
which was held in Paris, France on Thursday July 6th local time.

Japan Expo is the world's largest Japanese culture event,
presenting a wide variety of items relating to Japanese culture, including pop culture like manga, anime, video games, music, fashion and movies,
as well as cultural entertainment, kimonos, Japanese food and other forms of cooking, literature, traditional arts and more.
It's a momentous event that pulled more than 230000 visitors in 2016.

And at "Japan Expo Paris 2017",
The world premiere of "Pocket Monsters the Movie: I Choose You!" took place as the opening night event,
the only screening event for an all new feature film at this point.



This is the first time we try unveiling a Pokémon movie overseas prior to the Japanese premiere.
Ever since this event got announced at a Japan Expo press conference,
the place received a flood of inquiries about this world premiere, and had to quickly distribute numbered tickets in order to answer them.
However, at the day the expo opened,
so many visitors looking forward to this event were gathering at the ticket counter the event became standing-room only.

According to Japan Expo founder Thomas Sirdey, who was involved with the management of this world premiere,
"The Pokémon movies are extremely popular in France as well, so being able to watch the latest movie as an opening event
is the greatest experience Pokémon fans coming to Japan Expo will have had here thus far."
This movie is a story about the "meeting" and "promise" of Satoshi and Pikachu, who are currently absolutely perfect partners.
It's a touching story that both those watching a Pokémon movie for the first time,
but especially those already familiar with this duo, will not be able to watch without shedding tears,
and one person after another started crying loudly here in France as well.



When it was time for the stage greetings after the screening, director Kunihiko Yuyama, who has directed every Pokémon movie thus far, came onto the stage,
as did Satoshi's voice actor Rica Matsumoto and Pikachu.
The audience, which had just watched the movie, greeted them with loud cheers,
and when director Yuyama said "Nice to meet you. My name is Yuyama. How do you do?" in French,
the audience loudly shouted "We're doing fine!" back; The atmosphere in the hall was top notch from the very beginning!
"I enjoyed seeing the very pronounced reactions from the French audience, how they were laughing and clapping to the movie",
he said about the experience of watching the movie together with everyone in the hall.

As Rica Matsumoto then addressed the French audience that normally watches dubbed versions of the Pokémon movies and said
"Right now, voice actors all around the world are making people listen to Satoshi.
I want to say "thank you" to the Satoshis all over the world. And today I want to give you his voice live!
Are you ready? I got a Pokémon!",
the audience responded with excitement so far beyond Matsumoto's expectations it brought tears to her eyes.



When she sang the movie's opening theme, "Mezase Pokémon Master -20th Anniversary-",
the hall hit the peak of its excitement!
And as the event concluded with the entire audience of 3000 yelling "I choose you!" together,
national borders were truly eliminated and everyone came together as one!

After the stage greetings, voices of acclaim for the movie came one after another,
including "I have watched every Pokémon movie so far, and this one was the best yet! Très bien!" and "Even though this was a Pokémon movie, it made my father cry. I want to go watch it again with my entire family!"

In addition, it was announced that a Pikachu wearing the hat that Satoshi,
the protagonist of the TV anime series, wore when the series started airing 20 years ago (the Original Cap)
will be appearing all over the world local time Thursday July 6th (Japanese time Friday July 7th) in "Pokémon Go",
which has become a social phenomenon all over the world and which is currently celebrating the first anniversary of its launch.
We spotted Pokémon Go users excited at this announcement here at the Japan Expo as well,
here on this day that just saw its first world premiere in Pokémon movie history,
an event that blessed both France and the world at large with the 20th anniversary of the Pokémon movies.

Source: http://www.pokemon-movie.jp/news/?p=2931
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