Every spring and summer, anime (animation) films are shown in hundreds of movie theaters across Japan. In 1999 Japan's three biggest movie companies--Shochiku, Toei, and Toho--all released their spring lineup of movies on March 6. Toei has held an Anime Fair for schoolchildren every spring and summer since 1967. Toei has played a leading role in the history of Japanese anime: Its 1958 movie Hakujaden (Legend of the White Snake; released in the United States as Panda and the Magic Serpent), the first full-length color animation feature to be created in Japan, won many awards both in Japan and abroad. Toei's Anime Fairs have launched the movie versions of such popular TV series as Sailor Moon and Dragon Ball. As usual, the spring 1999 Anime Fair featured three titles. In Dr. Slump: Arale-chan no Bikkuri-Baan, the android heroine Arale travels all over the world to bring back a stolen treasure. In Yu-Gi-Oh!, the boy Yugi fights a powerful rival through various games. And Digimon (short for "digital monster"), which originally appeared as a next-generation Tamagotchi-type game, made its debut on the big screen in Digimon Adventure. Toho, meanwhile, has been releasing feature films of the same cartoon series, Doraemon, every spring since 1980. Doraemon is a cat-shaped robot that has come from the far future on a time machine. In spring 1999, Toho ran three Doraemon films--one long and two short--to commemorate 20 years of Doraemon movies. As in 1998, Shochiku released two action movies in the Ultraman series in 1999--featuring "ultraheroes" who have come from the M78 galaxy to rescue Earth from evil monsters. And from April 3 it showed the anime film, Marco: Haha o Tazunete Sanzenri (3,000 Leagues in Search of Mother), based on the 1886 novel Cuore by Italian author Edmondo De Amicis. These movies ran in about 640 theaters throughout Japan during the 1999 spring vacation, making it a busy time for not only the children but the parents accompanying them as well. Photos: Movie theaters showing these animation movies became full of kids and their parents during spring break. You can see pictures of these anime in the Japanese pages below: Toei Anime pages: Hakujaden, Dragon Ball (TV series), Dr. Slump, Yu-Gi-Oh!, Digimon Adventure

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