Kensuke’s Kingdom has completed its budget, thanks to an injection of €5.4 million (USD$6.5M) from the L.A.-based Align. The sum represents just over half the film’s total budget.
The film is an adaptation of Michael Morpurgo’s 1999 novel of the same name, which tells the story of a shipwrecked boy’s adventures on an island. The project is a U.K.-Luxembourg-France co-production involving Lupus Films (
Ethel & Ernest), Melusine Productions (
The British Film Institute awarded
Kensuke’s Kingdom £1.62M ($2.29M) in 2020 its biggest production grant of the year. Animation production began last September and final delivery is due in 2023. The film is sold by the U.K.’s Bankside Films.
They include additional Covid-related production awards for BFI-backed projects interrupted at the start of pandemic such as
Benediction (£341,182),
Pirates (£360,000).
Nearly all 10 titles, with the exception of
Earwig, also received £20,000 as part of pilot initiative BFI Step-up, which enabled productions to provide opportunities for production crew from under-represented groups to work on BFI-funded features
1.
Source: Lupus Films
‘Kensuke’s Kingdom’
Sally Hawkins, Cillian Murphy and Ken Watanabe are among the English-language voice cast of this animated feature, based on Michael Morpurgo’s bestselling children’s novel of the same name and adapted by Frank Cottrell-Boyce (
The Railway Man). It marks the feature directorial debut of both Neil Boyle, whose credits as an animator include