Production
The film was originally planned to be produced in 2013 but because of low budget and also technology, it was delayed until it was officially announced for production in May 2016. According to the director's press conference in March 2017:
[S]ince the main characters are the two brothers, where there is Ed, there will always be Al. Even just based on that, the amount of CG used becomes enormous. In this work, I'm using a technology that was used in Hollywood movies such as The Avengers. We're using a lot [of] new techniques that were never used in Japanese movies before..."
Since the original story consists of 27 volumes, I cut it down in to two hours, but we will stay faithful to the manga. ... I don't plan to change the setting, the world view, and make a different story... Of course we will have the philosopher's stone...[in the story].
On adapting the source material, Fumihiko Sori said, "I want to create a style that follows the original manga as much as possible. The cast is entirely Japanese, but the cultural background is Europe. However, it's a style that doesn't represent a specific race or country." Regarding the faithfulness of the adaptation, which has characters of non-Japanese ethnicity, the director said, "There will never be a scene in which a character says something that would identify him/her as Japanese."
Sori told Oricon he has a deep affection for the story that tells the "truth of living," and said, "It is my dearest wish to turn this wonderful story into a film, and it is not an exaggeration to say that I am living for this reason." He added that he "wants to create a wonderful film that uses techniques that challenge Hollywood", and noted that nowadays Japanese filmmaking techniques have progressed greatly.
Principal photography took place in Italy. Shooting was spotted in Volterra (identified as Reole from 06:53 to 12:54) on the first week of June and some scenes continued filming in Japan from June and finished on 26 August 2016.
Japanese VFX company OXYBOT inc. provided the visual effects for the film. The first teaser visual was unveiled on 31 December 2016. The updated version with the 2017 New Year Greetings were unveiled on the following day with the text "Happy New Year". In February 2017, they unveiled the release date of 1 December, with the CG appearance of Alphonse
On 19 February 2018, the film released on Netflix as a Netflix Original Film. Notably, in the English-language dub voice actors Vic Mignogna, Aaron Dismuke, and Caitlin Glass reprised their roles as Edward Elric, Alphonse Elric, and Winry Rockbell respectively from the Funimation dub of the Fullmetal Alchemist anime series.
