‘The Concierge’ Director Yoshimi Itazu Welcomes Us to His Creature Consumers’ Paradise

This article was written for the November '24 issue of Animation Magazine (No. 344).

Yoshimi Itazu’s The Concierge (2023) blends seemingly incompatible elements into a gentle, touching story. It’s a light comedy about a young woman growing into her dream job, but it carries a powerful, if understated, ecological message. It’s set in the 21st century and the characters use cellphones, but it evokes the palatial retail emporia of the 19th century — and a commitment to customer service that’s all but vanished. Its luxe settings envelop the viewer like a cashmere wrap, but it’s an exercise in minimal design that looks doubly striking at a time when many animated films are rendered in intricate detail.

Based on the manga The Concierge at the Hokkyoku Department Store by Tsuchika Nishimura that ran in Big Comic Zokan (2017-18), the film was released theatrically as The Concierge in the U.S. by Crunchyroll and Sony in September.

Itazu talked about the film with Animation Magazine in a recent Zoom interview from the Melbourne Film Festival, with Rika Shimo translating. He began by explaining that he wanted to communicate as much as he could about the main character through movement alone. On her first day as a concierge at the high-end Hokkyoku Department Store, Akino is eager to do her very best, but she’s more than a little maladroit.

Revealing Movements

“From the beginning, I wanted to express interesting aspects of the characters by using movement,” said Itazu. “I thought if Akino was a little bit clumsy because she’s a newbie and she’s a little bit uninformed in many ways, it would make her movements quite funny. As the movie progresses, you can actually see that the clumsiness of her movements is diminishing. You can see her development through the evolution of her movements.”

Akino grows into the job, although her progress is neither easy nor linear. One of her first clients is a glamorous sea mink who needs a present for her old-fashioned father. Akino suggests a fountain pen. But when an older sea mink in a traditional kimono comes to buy a present for his daughter, Akino realizes that it’s her customer’s father and what he really needs is a pocket watch: His thick fur makes his wristwatch hard to read. Akino dashes back and forth between counters, switching merchandise and making frantic explanations to both customers.

‘The subject of the film isn’t just the animals. I wanted to think about how difficult it is to understand each other — whether it’s communications between animals and animals or between animals and humans.’

— Director Yoshimi Itazu

She demonstrates her increasing assurance and competence when she rallies the staff of the store’s restaurant to help a shy Japanese wolf propose to his girlfriend in a memorably romantic way. She enlists fellow staffers and grateful customers to shoot a video of the store’s holiday decorations for a parakeet whose daughter is too ill to come shopping, things Akino could never have managed at the start of the film.

“I think it’s important for a story to have a funny element because that makes people relax and relate more to the movie,” Itazu continued. “Audiences can understand Akino’s character through their laughter. Many people who watch the movie will have experienced starting a job and eventually getting better at it. The audience can relate to her and feel close to her. I thought laughter would be a good way to get people involved in her story.”

Itazu preserved the look of Nishimura’s original manga (available in English in two volumes from Seven Seas Entertainment). The character designs are simple and sketchy, with a few lines suggesting a pose or an expression. “Because the characters are quite simple, you really have to be careful about how you place them in each scene,” he explained. “We had to be very aware of the backgrounds. But because the character designs are simple, it was much easier to move them than realistic characters would have been. We could depict their movements in a much more natural way. I looked to the older Toei Studio animation as a guide.”

As a director, Itazu will often pause the action, using a dynamic still frame to underscore a story point or an emotional moment. “I used it like a rhythm, so I was very careful in how I used it,” he said thoughtfully. “If I wanted to focus or strengthen a certain still frame, then I would use action around it and vice versa. I might use a still frame to actually emphasize the action. There might be very vigorous movement in a scene, and then it suddenly stops. When it stops, it really emphasizes that frame and gives it a lot of importance. I was really aware of that effect.”

Although The Concierge was animated by Production I.G, Itazu has worked at other studios: He did key animation for Satoshi Kon’s Paprika and Hayao Miyazaki’s The Boy and the Heron and The Wind Rises. “I think Kon-san has been an influence on my own work as a director — how to handle the structure of the entire film and how to think about the story,” he reflected. “I never tried to mimic him, but he has influenced me profoundly.”

Ring Them Up!

The entire film takes place within the Hokkyoku Department Store, which offers everything a customer could want. The minimal but luxurious merchandise counters and displays recall the elegant stores of a bygone era. “The department store itself is actually one of the characters,” Itazu commented. “While I visited the Bon Marché and Galeries Lafayette in Paris, it’s also based on some of the more traditional department stores in Japan. I tried to focus on the nostalgic aspect of the movie — the good old days.”

Although the Hokkyoku Department Store is staffed by humans, its customers are animals, and its most valued customers — the VIAs (Very Important Animals) — are endangered or extinct species. Among Akino’s clients, the sea mink and the Japanese wolf were exterminated in the late 19th and early 20th century.

“I’ve always been interested in ecology, and I’ve done some research on the subject,” Itazu said. “But the subject of the film isn’t just the animals. I wanted to think about how difficult it is to understand each other — whether it’s communications between animals and animals or between animals and humans. That was an idea I wanted the audience to think about.”

“In this movie, I really emphasized Japanese culture,” he concluded. “As I was aware of that, I made sure that it would be easy for not just Japanese viewers but for other people to understand. I think laughter is a really good medium for people to share their sentiments. When I brought The Concierge overseas, it seemed to strike a chord with foreign audiences as well.”

The Concierge had a limited theatrical release in September. It will make its streaming debut on Crunchyroll later this year.