Who was the definite breakout star of Star Wars: The Force Awakens? Unquestionably it was Daisy Ridley, who 99.9% of people had never heard of before they saw her scavenging away on Jakku. If you're looking to follow her career more closely now you could always try and catch up with Scrawl, which has been playing the festival circuit and will into next year. Or you could look forward to her next film, Studio Ghibli's Only Yesterday, in which she voices the lead character.
The film is directed by Isao Takahata, who was at the helm for arguably the best animated features ever made and certainly one of the top war movies, Grave of the Fireflies. But Only Yesterday is unique for a couple of reasons. First of all, it's a realistic film centering on a normal female character, and it was actually completed and released in Japan in 1991. Only now is it finally getting a U.S. release with Ridley, Dev Patel, and Ashley Eckstein (Star Wars Rebels) part of the voice cast.
Here's the synopsis: It’s 1982, and Taeko (Daisy Ridley) is 27 years old, unmarried, and has lived her whole life in Tokyo. She decides to visit her relatives in the countryside, and as the train travels through the night, memories flood back of her younger years: the first immature stirrings of romance, the onset of puberty, and the frustrations of math and boys. At the station she is met by young farmer Toshio (Dev Patel), and the encounters with him begin to reconnect her to forgotten longings. In lyrical switches between the present and the past, Taeko contemplates the arc of her life, and wonders if she has been true to the dreams of her childhood self.
Only Yesterday opens in New York on January 1st 2016, then expands on February 26th.
