‘Demon Slayer' movie director aimed to deliver nonstop demon battles

LOS ANGELES – For the Japanese action-packed anime film “Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba – The Movie: Infinity Castle,” chief director Hikaru Kondo set out to deliver something he’d never seen on screen before: relentless, back-to-back battles inside a demon-filled castle.

“I was trying to find examples or other films that were similar, that had a similar kind of composition or format, I guess you could say, to ours, and I couldn’t,” Kondo told Reuters.

“So, this could be perhaps one of the first films that exists that has this type of structure and narrative. It’s back-to-back-to-back combat,” he added.

The already surging global popularity of the manga and anime series “Demon Slayer” laid the groundwork for “Infinity Castle” to become the highest-grossing international film ever in the U.S. and land at the top of the Japanese box office.

The film, which arrived in Japanese theaters last July, earned a Golden Globe nomination for best animated film.

The movie is based on the “Infinity Castle” arc of the 2016-2020 “Demon Slayer” manga by Koyoharu Gotouge and is a direct sequel to the fourth season of the anime television series, which is produced by animation studio Ufotable for original streaming on the platform Crunchyroll.

The series follows teenage Tanjiro Kamado, who becomes a Demon Slayer after his family is murdered and his younger sister, Nezuko, is turned into a demon.

“Infinity Castle” places Tanjiro and his fellow Demon Slayer Corps members in a series of battles against the first and oldest demon Muzan Kibutsuji and the host of demons he summons in the “Infinity Castle.”

Kondo recalled being “cooped up” in his house for three weeks trying to figure out how to weave together the overall flow of the film’s action and drama to “astonish” audiences.

However, by the time he finished it, the film was too long.

“When you lose the groove, the audience becomes detached from your journey, then immediately I think they’ll just be disengaged and shut down,” he said about the importance of trimming the film to its runtime of 2 hours and 35 minutes.