Belle (2021 film)

Suzu Naito is a seventeen-year-old high school student who lives in the rural Kōchi Prefecture of Japan. When she was young, she was close with her mother, who supported her love for singing and writing songs. However, one day, Suzu witnessed her mother rescuing a child from a flooding river at the cost of her own life. The traumatic experience caused Suzu to resent her mother for "abandoning" her for a stranger's child and she became unable to sing. The event has led to her growing distant from her father, despite his attempts to reach out, though she remains close with a group of older choir teachers, who were her mother's friends. She is alienated from most of her classmates, with the exception of her childhood friend and self-appointed protector Shinobu Hisatake, on whom she has a crush; popular girl Ruka Watanabe; her sportsman classmate Shinjiro Chikami, nicknamed Kamishin; and her genius best friend Hiroka Betsuyaku.

On Hiro's suggestion, Suzu signs into the popular virtual metaverse known as "U" and creates a beautiful avatar with freckles she names "Bell", the English translation of her own name. Upon logging into U, Suzu finds herself capable of singing again. Bell's appearance is at first criticized due to her freckles, but after making several appearances while singing and with the assistance of Hiro, who has appointed herself as Bell's manager and producer, Bell soon becomes a big hit. Following her popularity, people start to refer to her as "Belle", which means "beautiful" in French.

During one of Belle's concerts, an infamously strong and near-unbeatable user simply called "The Dragon" (or "The Beast") makes a violent appearance and ruins the concert. This prompts a vigilante group led by the self-righteous Justin to begin hunting the Dragon, accusing him of disturbing the peace of U. Using a specialized program, Justin plans to unveil the Dragon's identity to the public. Suzu feels intrigued by the Dragon and begins to gather information about him. She discovers that he is popular amongst children, who consider him to be their hero, particularly a shy boy named Tomo who was in the news with his brother and father, following his mother's death. Belle searches U for the Dragon, while evading Justin. She is led to the Dragon's hidden castle by a mysterious angel avatar and finally meets the Dragon and his five guardian AIs. Despite their rocky start, Belle and the Dragon grow close. Meanwhile, in the real world, Ruka confides to Suzu that she has someone she likes. Since both Ruka and Shinobu are the most popular students at school, Suzu mistakenly believes that Shinobu is the one Ruka likes until Ruka later clarifies that the one she likes is Kamishin. With Suzu's help, Ruka and Kamishin are able to admit their feelings for each other.

Back in U, Justin captures and interrogates Belle, aware that she is close with the Dragon, and threatens to unveil her identity to the whole world if she refuses to cooperate. The Dragon's AIs rescue Belle at the last second. However, their intervention allows Justin and his group to locate the Dragon's castle and destroy it, though the Dragon escapes. Belle manages to find him and tries to help him, but he flees before she can do anything. Suzu and Hiro immediately work to find out the Dragon's real identity before Justin can and warn him. They find a live video feed of Tomo singing a song only Belle and the Dragon know, and realize that Tomo is the angel avatar, and that his older brother Kei is the Dragon. The feed reveals that Kei and Tomo are being abused by their father. Kei's anger and steadfastness in protecting Tomo is what gives The Dragon his unbeatable strength and rage in U. Suzu contacts Kei to help, but Kei does not believe that she is Belle. Shinobu, Ruka, Kamishin, and the choir teachers reveal their knowledge of Belle's true identity and urge Suzu to sing as herself in order to gain Kei's trust. Suzu unveils herself to the whole world in U and begins to sing, gaining support from everyone listening. Seeing this, Kei decides to trust her and tries to contact her again. Unfortunately, Kei's father sees the recorded video of his abuse posted online and immediately cuts off the internet connection before Kei can tell Suzu their address.

Using local news music from the TV and buildings visible from the windows in the recording of the room, Ruka and Kamishin deduce that Kei's hometown is Kawasaki, Kanagawa, near Tokyo. Since the authorities cannot intervene on abuse charges until 48 hours have passed, Suzu quickly rushes to the city alone to find Kei. Suzu locates Kei and Tomo and protects them from their father. Once the situation is settled, Suzu and Kei thank each other for giving one another courage. The next day, Suzu returns home; her father welcomes her at the station, and she warmly tells him she's back. Shinobu praises Suzu for her bravery and decides she no longer needs his protection. Finally understanding her mother's selfless actions, Suzu comes to terms with her mother's death and is ready to sing with her friends.

While Studio Chizu worked on the project, they had help from veteran Disney animator and character designer Jin Kim and Michael Camacho on the design of Belle and studio Cartoon Saloon for the background work of the world of U.[16][17]

Hosoda initially intended for Belle to be a musical, but considered the idea difficult due to Japan not having a culture of making musicals. However, he still wanted music to be central to the film, so he searched for a protagonist that could sing. He stated that he preferred the same person doing both speaking and singing voices to make it convincing, and searched for a singer who could express their feelings though song and move people, even if they don't understand Japanese. He then found Kaho Nakamura, whom he considered relatively unknown, but a perfect choice for the role. Hosoda stated that Nakamura was also involved in writing lyrics, so she could feel the lyrics she was singing.[18]

• Official website (in Japanese)
• Belle at Anime News Network's encyclopedia
• Belle at IMDb