Seems like only a week ago I posted up the announcement that Toshiaki Toyoda (Blue Spring, 9 Souls) is back from exile and making a feature film, and now we have the first image from the movie itself! Thanks of course going to the fine people at Twitch who pointed the way! Now normally I wouldn’t be too hyped for a flick like this, the whole fantasy magical world appearance and such really doesn’t get me going – but since it’s from Toshiaki Toyoda I know it’ll be amazing. No guessing necessary. This is what Twitch has for the plot of the film:

The time is the Middle Ages, when gods and demons reigned over a larger dominion than humans, before humans came to rule over the entire world. Oguri, a renowned masseur, is summoned to the fortress of the ruler of the dark world, a man known simply as the Lord and ailing from a venereal disease. After encouraging Terute—a captive princess from another land—to escape, Oguri is poisoned to death by the Lord before he can make his own getaway.

At a fork in the road between heaven and hell, Oguri is sent back to the land of the living in the form of a Hungry Ghost, in a state of apparent death. Saved by a monk who happened to pass by, he learns of a “spring of rebirth.” Meanwhile, Terute manages to flee from the Lord’s fortress and reunites with the undead Oguri. But the Lord is hot on their heels, hell bent on finding and punishing Terute.