Synopsis

Melancholy boy Blue is sent to spend the summer with his aunt in a fictional Southeast Asian country town. As he meets the local children, he gradually emerges from his sadness and joins their self-organized soccer tournament. Through friendship, play, and the simple pleasures of everyday life, Blue begins to open his heart and rediscover a sense of wonder.

Factoids & Trivia

• The project began in 2000 as a proposed 20-minute short about children playing soccer. Inspiration came partly from the movement and rhythm of the sport, as well as the 2002 World Cup, co-hosted by South Korea and Japan.

• As the story developed, it expanded into a feature-length film about childhood, friendship, and the importance of ordinary pleasures rather than remaining a conventional sports story.

• The film is designed as traditional, hand-drawn 2D animation. During the early production, computers were used to scan the drawings and assist with ink-and-paint work, but not to generate the animation itself.

• The setting is a fictional Southeast Asian town. Although the film draws on childhood memories of growing up in Vietnam, the location was deliberately kept imaginary so that its themes would feel more universal.

• The production has been made outside the major studio system. In 2003, the project had a team of seven animators, while a later account described an initial group of roughly 15 young artists whose numbers declined as funding became more difficult.

• The production's long development has become part of its identity. In 2025, approximately 30 minutes were reported to have been cleaned up, while the official production site continued to describe the film as an ongoing, self-funded project.

• The film's visual approach has been associated with the warmth of early Walt Disney features and the influence of Hayao Miyazaki, while retaining an intentionally personal and unconventional character style.