KESENNUMA, Miyagi Prefecture—A special screening here of Makoto Shinkai’s latest feature film hit further strengthened the famed director’s bonds with this northern city.

Following the earthquake and tsunami in Japan, Hollywood studios have postponed the releases of several films featuring images of mass destruction, flooding or entrapment.

The Year 5 and 6 kids at Oromahoe School have come through a tsunami and lived to tell the story. It was gory, scary, seat-of-the-pants stuff, as the ...