Cinefantastique Online

Here’s the Japanese trailer to SPACE BATTLESHIP YAMATO, the live action movie based on the anime series known in the US as SPACE CRUISER YAMATO and, more popularly STAR BLAZERS.

In the American market dubbed version of the cartoon, the ship was called the Argo, to disguise the fact that the ship was supposed to be  built from the wreckage of the WWII Imperial Japanese Naval battleship Yamato, sunk by US-led forces in 1945.

For many in the US, this might well have been a somewhat unpalatable reminder of the ultra-nationalist and expansionist fervor that drove that military-ruled regime to war.

SPACE BATTLESHIP YAMATO was directed by Takashi Yamazaki from an screenplay by Shimako Sato. It’s planned for a December release in Japan.