The movie was released on December 14, 2002 and won a popularity award from the Awards of the Japanese Academy. The movie inspired a manga by Shirasawa Marimo, which was released on January 6, 2003. The manga characters are based on the characters from the movie. The movie was released on June 21, 2003 on DVD and September 21, 2003 on VHS. Months prior to the DVD and VHS release of the movie a making of was released on January 21, 2003 in both DVD and VHS format.