I hunted down this movie because it was the first feature-length film helmed entirely by Mamoru Hosoda, who went on to do Summer Wars and Wolf Children. I have not seen any of the other One Piece movies, although I did watch the first couple of seasons of the series before (loved it at first, but the formula gets old).
It's a cute, nutty movie with a theme of friendship and the usual One Piece over-the-top craziness. There are definitely Hosoda touches in the design, which looks just a little different from that of the series, but it is still very much along the lines of what I've seen before. It's not a movie that would make you expect the director would go on to brilliance, but it's not a movie that makes you think that would never happen, either.
It's a cute, nutty movie with a theme of friendship and the usual One Piece over-the-top craziness. There are definitely Hosoda touches in the design, which looks just a little different from that of the series, but it is still very much along the lines of what I've seen before. It's not a movie that would make you expect the director would go on to brilliance, but it's not a movie that makes you think that would never happen, either.