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The Definitive Ghibli Rankings

From the guy who watched all of them, even Ocean Waves:

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When Marnie Was There: A Triumphant Swan Song for Studio Ghibli

In 2013, following the release of The Wind Rises, Hayao Miyazaki announced his retirement from feature films. It didn’t last long, but it did give us one of only a few Studio Ghibli films with neither directing nor screenwriting credit from Miyazaki or Isao Takahata: When Marnie Was There. The other two films with that distinction are Tales from Earthsea and The Cat Returns — an overambitious disaster and a delightful if superficial romp, respectively. 

Thankfully, Marnie is neither a disaster nor superficial: it’s a beautiful, true-to-life, emotionally powerful coming-of-age story. Released in 2014 and directed by Hiromasa Yonebayashi, the story centers on young Anna, a withdrawn and melancholic girl who is sent to spend time with her aunt and uncle in the countryside in hopes of ameliorating her asthma. 

There, she meets the enigmatic and titular Marnie, who seems to already know Anna and who lives in a mansion that seems to keep flipping from regal and fully-staffed to dilapidated and abandoned. Marnie’s identity and the source of Anna’s woes are equally engaging mysteries that Marnie wisely takes its time unspooling. 

While the visuals may not have the wow-factor of Arrietty, Yonebayashi’s stunning directorial debut, Marnie is still a feast for the eyes. What sticks out the most is the depiction of the Kushiro wetlands where Anna spends most of the movie. It inspired such a longing for that kind of natural landscape, in fact, that I literally got up and took my dog for a walk through some nearby woods about ⅔ of the way through this movie. You will want to move to rural Japan; accept this, and keep watching.

The other immediately striking element of Marnie is Anna herself. The movie opens with an internal monologue in which Anna describes how she’s never felt like she belongs; that sentiment has been shared by countless young-adult protagonists, but usually it feels like an afterthought tacked on in service of a bland “Be Yourself!” message. 

Marnie actually makes the effort to depict the causes and consequences of that feeling. Fellow introverts will cringe in solidarity as adults make social commitments on Anna’s behalf — right in front of her! — and nod vigorously as Anna flees incoming extroverted strangers to avoid the mortifying ordeal of being known. 

But flee all she likes, Anna can’t escape being adopted by a series of friendly, patient extroverts. There’s certainly some conflict in the story, and the movie isn’t shy about letting us see Anna mess up, but by and large Marnie pulls off the magic trick of having emotional resonance without ever really getting unpleasant. Most of the people Anna meets are wonderful, and it’s a pleasure watching her slowly come out of her shell. Studio Ghibli always knocks the side characters out of the park, and Yonebayashi continues the tradition here. 

Now, some people might take issue with the statement that Marnie never gets “unpleasant.” What I mean is that there are no Umbridges or Joffreys running around to make you want to throw things, and the characters aren’t punching bags like in Grave of the Fireflies. Marnie does get sad, but it’s a sweet, kind sadness that just makes you want to go upstairs and pick up your sleeping baby and hold her for a bit. I’m going to stop there because I’m writing this at work and really don’t want people to think I’m tearing up over the mushed peas and zoodles recipe I’m supposed to be editing. 

There’ll be more on this in the Spoiler Zone, but you should know that Marnie really benefits from being watched twice. It’s that rare mystery trick where the first watch is enriched by the desire to understand, and the second watch is enriched by already knowing. Even if you aren’t in the habit of re-watching films, you won’t be disappointed by a second viewing here.

I adore this movie. The only real flaw — made in all innocence, I believe — is also spoiler-y to talk about, but suffice to say that it is also less of a problem on the second watch. When Marnie Was There is funny, affecting, and beautiful. The future of How Do You Live seems uncertain; if Marnie does turn out to be the last Ghibli film, it would make a fine end for the storied studio. 

Up Next: Funny thing — there’s nothing next! At least, as of February 5, 2020, When Marnie Was There is the last movie published by Studio Ghibli. A few years ago, Miyazaki announced that he was un-retiring to direct a new film, How Do You Live; however, the projected release has been continually pushed back, and in a recent interview, Miyazaki stated that the movie was only about 15% finished after years of work. 

Barring new Ghibli movies, I’ll likely review some other highly acclaimed anime features — I’ve heard good things about Millennium Actress and Wolf Children. I considered reviewing Ocean Waves, a technically-Studio-Ghibli movie made for TV in the 90s, but I watched it and … it wasn’t great. I didn’t want to end my Ghibli reviews on a down note, so I decided against it. (The short version is that it’s an enemies-to-lovers story that spends 99% of the movie on the “enemies” part.) 

For now, I’ll just say thank you for reading. This has been a fun, educational, and fulfilling project for me, and the fact that any of these posts have been liked or shared has been a pleasant surprise. Watch out for one last Spoiler Zone after the image!

SPOILER ZONE

Ok, so, my biggest issue with When Marnie Was There is that, before you know that Marnie is Anna’s grandma’s ghost, the way their interactions are written and animated gives off biiiiiiiiiiiiiig lesbian vibes. The way they talk, when Marnie shows Anna how to row the boat, the dancing, the repeated pleas to keep their relationship a secret, the femme/butch pairing, the blushing .... let’s just say I have several notes from my first watch along the lines of “wow Anna has big Oblivious Lesbian energy” and “surprised to see something this progressive from Studio Ghibli way back in 2014.” 

Naturally, I retroactively felt super gross about all that once it clicked that it was a different relationship entirely. Like I said above, this is ameliorated when watching the second time. It’s easier to see how one could interpret it all differently — Anna’s not interested in Marnie romantically, she just literally has never had a friend before and is very overwhelmed by the whole thing. Likewise, Marnie is simply sad to see how withdrawn her granddaughter is and determined to bring her out of her shell.

But yeah, someone really needed to look at the storyboards for this movie and tell Studio Ghibli to tone down the blushing, because in 2020 (and I can’t imagine it came across too differently back in 2014) it reads as a very clearly telegraphed gay romance, and the ick factor when Marnie’s identity is revealed detracts from what is otherwise an extremely sweet, sad, and beautiful story.

Stray Notes:

well it’s been 5 minutes and I’m tearing up at this mom worrying about Anna so much

That title text is … bad

that exploding pumpkin bag shot 👍👍

“He’s a bear” lol

“A witch? Takes one to know one” SOLID BURN DAWG

“Extreme Introvert Gets Adopted by a Series a Extreme Extroverts”

WOW SAD

Aw it’s the first good Ghibli credits song, just in time for their last movie

wait, Hiromasa Yonebayashi was only 36 when he directed Arrietty?? 

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The Tale of Princess Kaguya: Adorable, Beautiful, and Sad

The concept of “fairy tales, but for adults” has had something of a heyday this millennium. We’ve seen ostensibly-for-kids-but-winking-at-adults comedies like Shrek and gritty reboots like Maleficent, and you could even say that Disney’s live-action remakes are an attempt to give the cartoon-averse adult an excuse to revisit an old fairy tale. 

Very few films, however, actually keep the spirit of a fairy tale while also making a mature movie for mature audiences. More explicitly than most media, fairy tales teach us lessons. A fairy tale “for adults” doesn’t need crass humor or political machinations — it needs a lesson that fits its audience. 

The only film I can think of that fits this description is The Tale of the Princess Kaguya. (If, like me, you’ve never heard the name spoken out loud, it’s KAH-goo-ya, not ka-GOO-ya.) Of course, complex and uncommon messages are Studio Ghibli’s bread and butter, so it should come as no surprise that they succeeded in making a true fairy tale for adults. It’s based on “The Tale of the Bamboo Cutter,” one of Japan’s oldest known stories, and it preserves the structure and logic of a fairy tale while taking it to new emotional heights.

Released in 2013, The Tale of the Princess Kaguya was the last film directed by the late Isao Takahata. As far as I can tell, it essentially sticks to the bones of its source material, but breathes an impressive amount of life and character into the story. 

That story concerns a couple who live in the countryside, making a humble living cutting bamboo. One day, the husband finds a magical baby girl who grows (supernaturally) quickly into a young child. She (Kaguya, although that name doesn’t come up for some time) loves the countryside, and her parents love her and take good care of her — but eventually her father decides that this heaven-sent child deserves better and relocates the family to the capitol, where Kaguya chafes under the constraints of high society.

The story seems to be following a typical fairy-tale path, but takes a pretty incredible swerve near the end, which I was surprised to learn was pulled directly from the original story. More about that in the Spoiler Zone! But here I’ll say that, like that other animation studio that adapts fairy tales into major motion pictures, Studio Ghibli does an excellent job here of taking the high-level storytelling of a fairy tale and filling in the blank spaces with charming and beautiful details.

Visually, the film is a clear successor to Takahata’s prior film, My Neighbors the Yamadas — only instead of mimicking the feel of newspaper comics, Princess Kaguya is rendered like a watercolor painting, to mesmerizing effect. Similarly to both The Yamadas and Pom Poko, Takahata varies the level of detail on screen to suit the moment. Blissful moments under falling cherry blossoms are rendered in beautiful detail, whereas a breathtaking frantic escape has details stripped away until it’s nearly abstract. The film is a sight to behold, innovative and beautiful.

Thematically, it’s closer to Only Yesterday than The Yamadas. There are plenty of moments of joy — Kaguya is an extremely adorable baby, and there’s some satisfying folk-tale turnaround moments — but overall, the story tends more towards melancholy. Our characters learn their lessons, but it’s too little and too late, leaving the audience with a solemn reminder to appreciate what they have here and now. The Tale of the Princess Kaguya wants you to realize that happiness is not found in the absence of strife, but in accepting and overcoming it. 

That may seem like a rough message, but then, this is a fairy tale for adults.

Up Next: It’s the last Ghibli movie! (As of 1/23/2020, anyway.) When Marnie Was There marks the return of Hiromasa Yonebayashi, director of the splendid Secret World of Arrietty. Let’s see if he can stick the landing on his sophomore project!

Stray Notes:

The most baby baby

This little :3 mouth girl rules

Kaguya’s flight from the mansion is breathtaking

Glad that the nobles weren’t total jerks

The fairy-tale turnabout of “get those treasures for me then” was immensely satisfying

The editing on the flying scene is kind of wonky

:3 girl with her friggin blade, A+

Is that … Buddha???

Does Buddha live on the moon???

Both dream(?) sequences are odd, they’re not really presented as dreams but the events therein don’t seem to have happened? Ambiguous, but in a frustrating way instead of a thought-provoking one 

SPOILER ZONE

Okay, so, with like 30 minutes of movie left, Kaguya remembers that she’s actually from the moon. Specifically, from a city of moon dwellers, who are now on their way to take her back, because she unwittingly used her moon powers to thwart a persistent suitor. The moon people arrive on a flying cloud, led by what looked to me like a representation of Buddha, which raised a lot of questions on my end about whether Buddha lives on the moon. Anyway, the moon people easily bypass the army protecting Kaguya, and put a cloak on her that makes her forget her entire earth life. It’s heartbreaking, and that’s where the movie ends. 

Like I said — the message for me was to appreciate what you have; Kaguya essentially laments that she was so focused on the things she didn’t like about city life that she made herself miserable during the short time she had here. It’s a complicated message — are we not supposed to stand up for ourselves and better our situations? — but that’s intentional. 

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Miyazaki Finally Gives Up the Pretense, Makes Film About Man Who Draws Planes for a Living

“Spoiler culture” gets a lot of hate these days, and I get it. There’s a fine line between “how hard is it to not talk about the plot of a movie you just saw on social media” and “how hard is it to stay off social media for a little bit until you’ve seen the movie.”

I get the annoyance with spoiler culture, but I also remember the circumstances that led to our current situation. I remember the mid-2000s, when trailers had half the movie in them — and if that wasn’t enough, the movie’s official website usually went the rest of the way. I remember poring over detailed rosters of every character set to appear in an upcoming X-Men movie. Even Pixar fell into the over-sharing trap — The Incredibles villain Syndrome, who doesn’t appear until a good chunk of the movie has passed, had a bio on the official website with his “powers” and evil plan right there for 12-year-old Chase to read all about. 

This led to teenage Chase making a conscious decision to not seek out information about movies that he already wanted to see, a policy I still roughly adhere to today. My greatest success was with Ant-Man, which I managed to see in theaters without having seen a single trailer. Usually, though, it means I just stick to teaser trailers. 

This go-in-blind mentality is never easier than when writing these reviews, since there’s not exactly a marketing blitz, past or current, for Hayao Miyazaki’s The Wind Rises. So far, I think my policy of avoiding both trailers and reviews of these movies has served me well, helping me to form my own thoughts without being biased one way or another. Unfortunately, this policy may have done more bad than good with this particular movie.

The Wind Rises was released in 2013, and is (for now) the last film directed by Miyazaki. It’s a dramatized biopic of Jiro Horikoshi, designer of Japan’s infamous “Zero” fighter planes — but you wouldn’t guess that from the movie itself. Not knowing anything of the film going in, I assumed I was watching a historical drama, like From Up on Poppy Hill or Grave of the Fireflies. As such, I was confused at the pace of the movie, which skips freely through large portions of Horikoshi’s life. The rapid and largely unannounced jumps in time and the lack of chyrons made it difficult for me to get a handle on the time period — although I’ll admit it probably wouldn’t be nearly so difficult for someone native to Japan, who could likely guess closely enough from the clothes, architecture, and other context clues. 

Beyond being confused about the setting, though, my lack of foreknowledge of The Wind Rises left me confused about the story the movie was telling. When you know a story is based on true events, it changes how you experience it. Studio Ghibli already departs from traditional Western ideas of storytelling and structure, and when you throw real-world subject matter into the mix, it goes further afield still. 

This is all to say: I think I would’ve enjoyed The Wind Rises more if I’d understood what it was beforehand. It’s a bit like how I kept waiting for the magic to show up in Whisper of the Heart, only it was a bigger, structural issue — something just felt off, until I pulled up the movie’s Wikipedia page after it ended and suddenly things clicked into place. 

Is the movie at fault for not spelling out its premise? Even the trailer doesn’t mention that it’s based on a real person. More than ever, I think that cultural differences may play a role here. I get the feeling that Jiro Horikoshi is relatively well-known in Japan; it would make all the difference watching this movie if you were vaguely aware of Horikoshi’s name and achievements.

As for the movie itself: it’s breathtakingly beautiful. The animation is almost insultingly lavish, like the third dining room on an episode of Cribs. Horikoshi’s glasses distort your view of his face, just like in real life. There’s a close-up involving a moving slide rule that made me gasp with its detail. The Wind Rises portrays Horikoshi as a dreamer, and his dreams constantly leak into the world around him, to wondrous effect.

The audio work is similarly audacious. Horikoshi’s (and Miyazaki’s) infatuation with flying machines breathes life into them, reflected not only in the lively way they’re animated, but also in the choice to use human vocals for the sound effects. The planes literally hum, roar, and gasp — never quite approaching cartoonish personification, but instead letting us see them through the engineer’s eyes. 

Other aspects of The Wind Rises aren’t quite as thrilling. I think there’s something very worthwhile in the film’s message on trying to make something beautiful in a world bent on cruelty, but it’s a bit muddied by a strange insistence that creative people have only 10 years to produce their life’s work. It’s an oddly specific limit, made even odder by Miyazaki’s own prolific career — at the time of this film’s release, his directing career alone stretched over 34 years. This may sound like nitpicking, but the 10 years number basically bookends the film, so I feel justified in calling shenanigans. 

Equally odd is the film’s love story. While beautiful and charming at times, it ends on an strange and unsatisfying note that makes me question the purpose of including it at all; did they simply feel that they couldn’t make a whole movie only about designing planes? If so, they could’ve done more to integrate the two stories, especially since this plot line was already entirely fabricated. 

To end on a positive note: the voice cast for this film is impossibly stacked. You’ve got Horikoshi voiced by Joseph Gordon-Levitt, his work buddy voiced by John Krasinski, his boss voiced by Martin Short, Emily Blunt as his love interest, Mae Whitman as his little sister, Werner Herzog as his random German friend, Stanley Tucci as his Italian dream-friend, Zach Callison as young Horikoshi, and Elijah Wood in a role so small I literally can’t figure out what it was. It should be difficult to pick a favorite among such a lineup — and they all do great work here — but the runaway winner is, of course, Werner Herzog. The raspy voice and dry humor he brings to the sympathetic Castorp are a highlight of an already beautiful movie. 

I fully expect that, when I read other reviews of The Wind Rises, they will have only the highest praise for it. I can see where they’re coming from; this is a movie with breathtaking visuals, an innovative soundscape, a moving message, and talented cast. For me, however, those individual elements aren’t brought together in the service of a compelling story.

Up Next: The Tale of Princess Kaguya! It’s the last film directed by the late Isao Takahata and I’m ready to be emotionally destroyed. It’s also the second-to-last Ghibli movie (as of 2019), which is wild! Will I finish these reviews before the year ends?? The suspense is killing me!

Alternate Titles: The Wind Rises: Because No One Wanted to Put Poppy Hill on Their Best-of-the-Decade Lists

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A Soapy Sub-Plot Diminishes the Otherwise Brilliant From Up on Poppy Hill

In his excellent series, Movies with Mikey, Mikey Neumann asks a question about Jurassic Park II: Can one stupid scene ruin a great movie? When that little girl defeats a previously terrifying velociraptor with “gymnastics,” it undermines their power to scare the audience and spotlights a character the audience already doesn’t like. But does that erase any and all good qualities the rest of the movie has?

This question is terribly relevant to From Up on Poppy Hill, a 2011 film directed by Gorō Miyazaki. The son of Hayao Miyazaki, Gorō also directed the disappointing Tales from Earthsea. In Poppy Hill, he appears to have learned some lessons from his previous experience; the movie is enjoyable, moving, and packed with some of Studio Ghibli’s best dialogue yet. 

This brings us back to Mikey’s question: Can the inclusion of a subplot that is in poor taste, hackneyed, and unnecessary ruin an otherwise fantastic film? Let’s just say this review’s going to have a hefty Spoiler Zone.

There’s plenty to talk about before we get there, though. Set in1963, Poppy Hill tells the story of two teenagers, Umi and Shun. Umi is uber-responsible, essentially running a boarding house for her Grandmother while also studiously attending school and keeping an eye on her younger sister. She doesn’t have much choice in the matter; her father died while serving  in WWII, and her mother is studying in America.

Shun has a more normal home life, but is deeply involved in “the Latin Quarter,” a massive, old, and dilapidated building that houses innumerable school clubs (all of which are apparently boys-only). The major plot thread of the movie concerns attempts by, you know, Big Business or whoever to demolish the Latin Quarter and build a shiny new facility in its place. The facility would still be for the students, so it’s not a matter of losing their place; it’s a matter of losing the historical building itself.

While Umi’s extreme competence and selflessness endear her to the viewer, the Latin Quarter steals the show whenever the characters visit. I always think it’s bogus and pretentious when people speak of a city or location as “another character, really,” but they’d probably say it about the quirky clubhouse. I’d still disagree, though. The Latin Quarter is such a fun locale because of the many well-written actual characters inside it. The lavish details of the building itself don’t hurt, of course, but it’s really the clubs themselves that bring it to life.

A big part of that comes from some of the best, let’s call it, “background dialogue” of any movie I’ve seen. Neither Umi nor Shun are particularly funny, but the large cast of unnamed Latin Quarter club members are consistently hilarious throughout the movie. At the risk of doing the original screenwriters a discredit, I’m tempted to lay some of this success at the feet of Kathleen Kennedy and Frank Marshall, who oversaw the production of the U.S. dub. Both also worked on the dubs for Ponyo and Arrietty, were also excellently localized. Whoever deserves the credit, the movie is much richer for it.

Now, I’ve said that Umi and Shun aren’t especially funny, but that doesn’t mean they aren’t compelling. Just like the club members who populate the Latin Quarter, the protagonists are endearing because they both feel like they have lives outside of this movie. In different ways, Umi and Shun are both competent and passionate people, avoiding the “waiting for the plot to start” feeling that comes from less fully realized characters. Umi in particular has a moving emotional arc, made all the more powerful by how much of her growth, while inspired by those around her, seemed to come from decisions she made on her own. 

Clearly, there’s a lot to love about From Up on Poppy Hill. The fly in the ointment shows up as Umi and Shun grow closer. It’s only natural that the movie would introduce some form of conflict into the story of their relationship, but the chosen form of that conflict leaves a bad taste in your mouth. It’s something of a twist and happens a good bit into the movie, so I’ll only discuss it directly in the Spoiler Zone, but the long and short of it is that it was a poor choice, it doesn’t give our protagonists anything interesting to do, and it took me about 10 seconds to think of an alternative that would involve minimal differences to the rest of the story.

You may recall that Gorō’s previous directorial effort, Tales From Earthsea, showed some promise but was ultimately weighed down by its failures. You may wonder if Poppy Hill is in a similar situation; fortunately, although the Bad Subplot does detract from the movie, the ratio of good to bad here is wildly better than in Earthsea. This time around, the strengths outweigh the blunders, and I recommend it to any Ghibli fans — I just wish the recommendation didn’t have to come with an asterisk. 

Up Next:

It’s The Wind Rises! It’s currently Hayao Miyazaki’s most recent film (no release date for How Do You Live? yet) and I’m very excited for it. 

Stray Notes:

Maybe my favorite of the many great background lines in the clubhouse: “How can we make archaeology cool again?” “We can’t.”

woooaaaah floor potato storage

Ghibli knows how to cut away from a joke (and not dwell on it)

Wow they’re really hitting the old vs new thing hard

Artist girl is an enormous mood

Lil Umi and her flags OH NO

Urinal conversation huh

“It’s like a cheap melodrama” YEAH KINDA MY MAN

Ah yes, rice goop 

Giant Philosophy Man is great

Chairman guy has a great voice

That explosion was magnificently animated

Spoiler Zone

So, Umi and Shun are growing closer and like 5 seconds from making out when they discover that Umi’s late father is also Shun’s birth father, who gave him to Shun’s adoptive parents when he was still just a baby. They’re actually brother and sister! Who doesn’t love a good incest subplot?

Besides being soapy and gross, it just doesn’t make for a good story. It’s an automatic shutdown; you can’t even root for them to “overcome” this obstacle and still end up together, because … incest. While you could say there’s something to watching them learn to interact with each other non-romantically, it just kind of torpedoes their part of the movie for a bit. 

I say for a bit, because of course this subplot is resolved the only way it possibly could be: Oops, they actually aren’t brother and sister! Herein lies the other part of the problem — the resolution has nothing to do with the efforts of Umi and Shun. Like I said, it doesn’t really work to have them trying to “solve” this problem, so they’re simply informed at the end of Act 3 that Umi’s dad took baby Shun from another dude, who died, and gave him to Shun’s birth parents. 

Action is artificially injected into this story by having the not-so-star-crossed pair race across town so they can meet a sailor who knew their parents before his ship leaves. While I understand that they’d want to meet this man, they both seemingly know all the important bits — i.e., that they aren’t related — before they talk to him, which makes the sense of urgency feel very forced. I say “seemingly” because for reasons unknown, we only see Umi learn this crucial information. We never see Shun learn it, and we never see the two of them talk about it. Presumably, what should’ve been a climactic moment happened off-screen.

All the narrative problems aside, it’s also just gross whenever the scripts ties itself into knots to make incest a concern. It was bad in Speaker for the Dead, it was bad in the trailer for that stupid theme park show, it’s bad in every other comedy anime, and it’s bad here. 

I can only assume that this was their way of having the relationship reflect the theme of the past affecting the present? But they could’ve just as easily introduced conflict through a revelation that Umi’s dad was somehow responsible for the death of Shun’s dad: it makes the past a barrier between them, puts them in a place to work at not letting the past actions of others affect their future, AND at no point does anyone have to say, “wait, don’t worry, it’s actually not incest!” Wins all around!

[howdoyousayghibli]

Arrietty: Back to (Incredible) Basics

I didn’t realize this until the opening credits played, but The Secret World of Arrietty (2010) makes four adaptations of written stories in a row from Studio Ghibli — Howl’s Moving Castle, Tales from Earthsea, and Ponyo being the other three. I’ll admit that Ponyo is a bit of a stretch, but Hayao Miyazaki has stated that his inspiration was Hans Christian Anderson’s fairy tale, so I’m sticking with it. 

Arrietty is an adaptation of Mary Norton’s widely beloved children’s novel, The Borrowers. While it was released as The Borrower Arrietty in Japan, the U.S. and UK releases were titled The Secret World of Arrietty and Arrietty, respectively; I can’t fathom why neither wanted to promote its association with a popular book, but here we are.

These four adaptations make for some interesting comparisons, to the extent that I wonder if there was some sort of strategy meeting held at Ghibli headquarters after Tales from Earthsea squirmed out into the world. That movie, and, to a lesser but still noticeable extent, Howl’s Moving Castle were both stuffed to the brim with mysteries, big ideas, and subplots, and they suffered for it. In contrast, Ponyo and Arrietty are simpler both narratively and thematically, but are astounding in their technical artistic achievements.

Arrietty tells the story of a family of Borrowers, tiny people who live under the floorboards and survive by “borrowing” what they need — such as a cube of sugar, basketball-sized to them — from the full-size humans who live above them. The main focus is on the family’s daughter, Arrietty, who is just old enough to join her father on his borrowing trips. Their comfortable but tenuous existence is disrupted by the arrival of Sean, a sickly young boy who’s been sent to live with his grandmother and her caretaker for some peace and quiet. 

These two plot points — the Borrowers’ survival and Sean’s sickness — are really the only plot points of Arrietty. This and the fact that both of these stories are actually addressed and resolved is refreshing after the overcomplicated Howl’s Moving Castle and Tales from Earthsea. 

Arrietty is a classic Ghibli protagonist — spirited, independent, and curious. Sean is also compelling; his melancholy brings to mind Princess Mononoke’s Prince Ashitaka and makes an engaging counterpoint to Arrietty’s enthusiasm and determination. The two are voiced by Bridget Mendler and David Henrie, whose resumés both largely consist of various Disney Channel shows. Fellow Disney Channel alumnus Moisés Arias (he was also, bizarrely, Bonzo in Ender’s Game) joins the cast as the fun-but-racistly-designed Spiller.

The adults of the cast pulled in a bit more star power — Arrietty’s parents, Pod and Homily, are voiced by Will Arnet and Amy Poehler. It’s easy to hear the Batman in Pod’s gravelly seriousness, but Arnet manages to infuse equal amounts of gravel and affection into Pod’s sparse dialogue. Poehler, meanwhile, gets some of the movie’s best dialogue as the anxious Homily; the character easily could’ve been obnoxious, but, as 6 seasons of Parks and Recreation can attest, Poehler is relentlessly charming and elevates each line she’s given.

There’s great characters and voice acting in Arrietty, but where the film really shines is in the presentation. Studio Ghibli uses the diminutive size of the protagonists as a chance to show off — throughout the movie, details of animation and sound design reinforce the tiny scale of the world we’re viewing. 

Visually, these reminders come in two forms: the creative ways that the Borrowers re-purpose (downscale?) the things they borrow, and the details with which the animators pack each shot.

The Borrowers’ ingenuity is a lot of fun to look out for throughout the movie, from stamps as wall art to soda can pop-tabs used to hang soup ladles. I can’t say how many of these were thought up by the Ghibli team and how many are pulled from the novels, but either way, they point to a well-thought-out world and add a great deal of charm.

The animation details, despite everything, blow me away. I feel Studio Ghibli shouldn’t be able to surprise me anymore, but by scaling down the action, they created new opportunities to impress. The premise allows for details like the grain of the wood inside the walls, rough but worn smooth and shiny, or the way water clings together, pouring out of their tea kettle in bulbous fist-sized drops. 

The sound design is similarly effective — a ticking clock can thunder across an entire room, and a giant hand can silence the rest of the world as it closes around a Borrower. It’s clear that the team behind this film saw the Borrower’s size as not just a premise, but a challenge, which they met amply. 

There’s a YouTube channel called Every Frame a Painting, probably most famous for their “Marvel Symphonic Universe” video. I happen to think that particular video is pretty off-base, but I love the channel as a whole. I bring them up because of their “Edgar Wright - How to Do Visual Comedy” video. It’s a great video, which you should watch, but the thrust of it is that the humor in Edgar Wright’s comedies doesn’t rely solely on dialogue like in many other comedies. The video posits that, if all your humor comes from funny dialogue, you’re throwing away the visual aspect of the medium — why not tell the story in a novel, or a podcast, or a stage play? 

This is a roundabout way of saying that Arrietty feels like a film that is truly firing on all cylinders. The premise, characters, animation, and sound design all reinforce one another; they feel deliberately interwoven in a way that few films do. 

Like many Ghibli movies, in a thematic sense Arrietty didn’t exactly leave me satisfied, but that same dissatisfaction has kept me thinking about the movie weeks after seeing it. (Vague spoilers ->) Sean’s attempts to help the Borrowers largely leave them worse off than before; does that mean he should have done nothing? Or did he just need to be more thoughtful? Are the Borrowers at fault for being too suspicious? It’s hard to agree with that when there’s ample evidence supporting their behavior. (<- End spoilers) These kinds of questions mean that, even the movie lacks a certain catharsis, it inspires further thought in a way that a lot of entertainment doesn’t. 

Up Next: 

From Up on Poppy Hill! Goro takes a second stab at directing — let’s see if he learned his lesson from Tales from Earthsea, shall we?

Alternate Titles:

Arrietty: Ah, That’s Better

Now You’re Just Showing Off, Mr. Miyazaki

“Arrietty, Kids?” “Aye Aye, Captain!”

Stray Notes

The crow and bird fighting are a great The Cat Returns callback 

”can I have some warm milk?” You go sneaky Sean, this kid rules

Has Mr. Ghibli ever seen a boy that wasn’t skin and bones?

*sees raccoon* haha sick Pom Poko reference

Wish I had a Lego Batman dad

And a Leslie Knope mom

DON’T RUN SEAN YOU’RE SICK

Why do they randomly emphasize the T sound in Arrietty sometimes (ARE-ee-eh-dy vs. AIR-ee-EH-tee)

Yooooo Spiller is tsundere AF

TOM HOLLAND voices Sean in the UK version??? And it was his first role in anything ever????

[howdoyousayghibli]

Tales from Earthsea Can’t Survive Broken Promises

I really didn’t think it would come to this, folks, but Tales from Earthsea (2006) is not a good movie. 

There have been a couple movies I’ve reviewed so far that weren’t my cup of tea — I didn’t find Only Yesterday or My Neighbors the Yamadas to be very satisfying, for example. This movie goes far beyond that; I can confidently say that this isn’t a matter of my personal taste. Tales from Earthsea has its moments, but they are totally outweighed by its failings.

Now that you know what you’re in for, let’s back up a bit. Tales from Earthsea was the first of two movies directed by Hayao Miyazaki’s son, Gorō. It is (very) loosely based on the Earthsea series of novels by acclaimed sci-fi/fantasy author Ursula K. Le Guin. Le Guin’s novels often trade in the same kind of subversion of typical Western storytelling that Studio Ghibli’s movies do, which makes this movie all the more tragic. 

Taking place in the magical world of Earthsea, the plot concerns a young prince on the run and a seasoned wizard searching for the cause of a series of worldwide calamities. The plot is also the source of this movie’s troubles. The casting, animation, and writing are all much less problematic, so let’s start with those.

According to something I read somewhere, Goro Miyazaki was hired to write and direct Earthsea based on the strength of the storyboards he’d drawn for it; while the decision to have him in those particular roles didn’t pan out, it’s easy to see how his storyboards could’ve instilled such confidence. The opening sequence, set on boats amidst a storm, is especially memorable and striking, and the designs for the dragons, alien and metallic, set them apart from the dragons of many other fantasy worlds. 

The casting is also well done. As Sparrowhawk, the wizard searching for the source of the world’s troubles, Timothy Dalton brings a sense of wisdom and experience that is easy to believe in. It’s crucial to the thrust of this story that Sparrowhawk be a much more down-to-earth wizard than your standard Dumbledores or Merlins, and Dalton gets that across. 

Equally up to her task is Mariska Hargitay — from Law & Order: SVU — as Tenar, Sparrowhawk’s … important … person? The nature of their relationship is left vague, but the important thing is that Tenar delivers several lines that efficiently hint at a lot of unspoken backstory, which does wonders for the film’s worldbuilding. Hargitay makes these lines sound natural when they could’ve easily come of as stilted, and she and Dalton bring great chemistry and history that makes the second act of Tales from Earthsea its best. The rest of the cast is less effective, but they get the job done.

Almost disappointingly, there’s some good writing hidden in this movie as well. Before it goes completely off the rails, and even a little after, there are interesting conversations about death, and how it gives meaning to life. For a moment, you’re willing to forgive a few oddities and believe that this movie really understood the books it adapted, with its deliberate pace, meditative feel, and pragmatic wizards. 

Then the climax kicks into motion, and everything falls apart. 

If, against my recommendation, you plan on watching this movie, here’s the no-spoilers version. The movie sets up a lot of questions in the first two acts, and even in the third — what is the shadow person plaguing Prince Arren? Why did Prince Arren murder his father? Where did Therru get her scar? Who even is Therru? What’s up with Arren’s sword? What was up with those two dragons fighting in the opening scene? Why does Cob want Arren’s true name? What does knowing someone’s true name even mean, in a practical sense?

Dear reader, literally none of these questions are answered in any kind of coherent fashion. I want to make it clear that I’m not complaining about not getting answers; answers come, but they are the ravings of madmen. Answers and revelations and problems and solutions either come completely out of the blue, or else fly in the face of things we were just told minutes ago. 

As I watched, I continued to hold out hope that soon, something would happen to elucidate the madness I was watching. Surely, soon there would be a revelation that would snap everything into place, justifying my investment in this film and its story. Instead, the nonsense continues right up until the credits. 

In his excellent Movies with Mikey episode on The Lost World, Mikey Neumann asks if one utterly stupid moment can ruin an otherwise good movie. Maybe one moment can’t, but an utterly stupid ending can. Whatever talent or joy exists in the first hour and change of Tales from Earthsea is completely tainted by its disastrous ending. The beginning of any story is a promise, and the middle prepares us for the fulfillment of that promise. A movie can survive a botched beginning or middle if it makes good on its promises — Rogue One is a great example of this. But no movie can survive a failure, on the most basic level, to keep the promises it made. 

If you’ve experienced the frustration and betrayal of watching Tales from Earthsea, you might enjoy commiserating with my very spoiler-y and not particularly coherent notes on the ending:

The opening scenes are very cool! Dragon fights, magic not working, plagues etc., a king’s demand to get to the bottom of it, his assassination! Exciting!

Then ………… Patricide Lad and a Very Boring Wizard go for a very long walk

Bad Decisions are made

Oh hey, things are getting interesting! A plot is happening! Dastardly schemes and getting to know our characters! The villain is pretty creepy actually!

But then …. everything stops even trying to make sense

Nothing about Cob needing prince’s true name makes sense (the drug callback is nice though)

True name gives Cob power over Princeling until it doesn’t

Sword stops Cob’s power, until it doesn’t

Actually cutting off Cob’s hand unleashes his True Power, you idiot, duh

Girl Zuko was a dragon?????

Sparrowhawk is freed! Except …. he’s just gonna watch, i guess

Oh, now dragon girl is a human girl again, i guess

Why did Arren kill his dad??? Where did the shadow boy come from????? Why was the shadow good at the end????????

Arren talks about his inner darkness or whatever but like, why?? What made you so sad/mad/existential that you spawned Shadow Arren?

There’s definitely some interesting stuff in here about how death is what gives meaning to life, no shadow without light etc., but it just throws it all in the garbage with that ending

Just …………………. Dumb.

Alternate Titles:

Patricide Lad and the Very Boring Wizard

More like FAILS from Earthsea, GOT EM

Tales from Earthsea: Good, then Boring, then Good, then Very, Very Bad

Up Next:

Technically, the next film Studio Ghibli made was the adorable Ponyo, but that was actually the first movie I reviewed in this series. So instead, I’ll be watching Arrietty — I know literally nothing about it, but it can’t possibly be worse than Tales from Earthsea was! See you then!

[howdoyousayghibli]

Howl’s Moving Castle Shines Technically, But Strains Against Ghibli’s Narrative Style

To my knowledge, Howl’s Moving Castle (2004) was Studio Ghibli’s first time adapting an existing book into a movie. For those unfamiliar, the film is based on a novel of the same name by the inimitable Diana Wynne Jones. If you haven’t read any of her books, what are you even doing reading my dumb blog?? Go read The Dark Lord of Derkholm right now. I’ll wait. The summary doesn’t do it justice, just read it. 

Anyway, Howl’s Moving Castle (the novel) is excellent as well, although I have to admit I haven’t read it in at least a decade. For those of you who have read the novel, it’s best to know going in that the film is a very loose adaptation. For those of you who haven’t read it, the movie tells the story of Sophie, a young, timid hatmaker who happens to run afoul of a very powerful witch. Sophie is cursed with immediate old age, and it seems her only hope of breaking the curse lies with the powerful, enigmatic, and extremely vain Wizard Howl — and his captive fire demon, Calcifer.

Howl’s Moving Castle is, of course, beautiful. The vaguely European landscapes from Kiki’s Delivery Service are back and more beautiful than ever, and it seems that by 2005 Studio Ghibli has finally nailed down the integration of CGI with their more traditional animation. The titular castle is a technical achievement, and a certain flashback sequence is particularly stunning. Also making a return is delicious Ghibli food — don’t even think about watching the breakfast scene if you don’t have bacon and eggs in your fridge right this second. (Also don’t think about how long Howl’s bacon had been sitting out.) Based solely on the animation, I would say that this was Studio Ghibli’s greatest work yet — an extremely high bar. 

The casting also deserves attention. Possibly spurred on by Spirited Away’s Oscar win, Howl’s Moving Castle secured some big names for its English dub — principally, Christain Bale as Howl and Billy Crystal as Calcifer. At first, Bale’s gravelly tones sound a bit odd coming from the somewhat foppish Howl, but his performance grows more natural as we see more of Howl. If you were feeling charitable, you could even posit that this was intentional, reflecting the way Howl puts on less of a facade as he gets closer to Sophie.

In contrast, Billy Crystal’s Calcifer is an immediate success. Crystal easily manages the fast-talking fire demon’s habit of switching from sassy confidence to pitiful pleading, proving more than a match for the delightful character design and animation. 

The rest of the cast is less famous (to me, at least) but no less capable; a pre-Peeta Melark Josh Hutcherson voices Howl’s adorable young apprentice, and acclaimed Golden Age actress Lauren Bacall brings gooey disdain to fantastically animated Witch of the Wastes. Sophie’s voice acting is divided between Emily Mortimer (young Sophie) and Jean Simmons (old Sophie) (that’s Jean, not Gene). As with Howl, young Sophie’s voice is a little stilted at first, but quickly grows more comfortable — and both actresses do an admirable job of selling themselves as older and younger versions of the same character. 

So, the casting is great, and the animation and character design are great. What about the story? Let’s ease in to that one.

If you know me, you probably know that I’m a big fan of Brandon Sanderson’s novels. I used to think that a Ghibli adaptation of Mistborn or The Way of Kings would be the best-case scenario. While I’m sure it would produce some stunning imagery, I’ve realized that I don’t actually think they would be a good fit for each other.

Where Brandon Sanderson excels at build-up and payoff, Studio Ghibli is generally uninterested in that specific kind of Hollywood-style catharsis. The mysteries in Howl’s Moving Castle aren’t tied up in neat bows, the villains don’t get satisfying take-downs, and some questions are left unanswered. This can be frustrating, but it also is what makes so many of Studio Ghibli’s movies stick with you after you watch them. 

Now, this style works better in some circumstances than in others; for example, the ambiguity of Princess Mononoke is essential to the film, and it would be lesser without it. In Howl’s Moving Castle, the subversion of our expectations is most effective when it comes to the Witch of the Wilds. The ending of her story isn’t what we expect, or indeed, what we want. It left me frustrated at first, but the more I thought about it — well, the more I thought about it. Why did the characters treat her that way, and why did it bother me so much? I still haven’t come to an answer, but that’s exactly the point: it’s about the thinking, not the conclusion. 

This kind of non-payoff is less effective, however, in the case of this movie’s capital-m Mystery: what is the nature of Calcifer and Howl’s bond? We are told that this is the crux of removing Sophie’s curse, setting it up as the central plot point aside from Howl and Sophie’s relationship. The issue isn’t necessarily that we don’t get answers — we do, they just don’t feel particularly consequential when they come. It’s the same kind of subversion as the Witch of the Waste’s story, except it doesn’t feel like it serves a purpose. For more detail on this, catch me in the Spoiler Zone.

Howl’s Moving Castle is an extraordinary work of animation, pushed even higher by an excellent cast. Even if the movie stumbles a bit with the denouement, it’s well worth watching — you’d be hard-pressed to find another movie with this much … heart. 

Up Next: Tales of Earthsea, another adaptation of a book I read over a decade ago. I don’t know much about the movie, but the whispers I’ve heard haven’t been particularly encouraging. Let’s hope they’re wrong!

Alternate Titles:

Howl’s Computer-Generated Castle

The Curious Case That’s Cute as a Button

~SPOILER ZONE~

Okay, so: Howl gave Calcifer his heart! Wow! Now, if only that had … any consequences. At all. 

I hear you already — “Howl not having a heart is the reason he acts the way he does!” Sure, but then why is he already changing his ways before Sophie puts his heart back inside him? Maybe there’s more to this that I could pick up on watching it a second or third time, but as it stands right now, it just fell a bit flat. 

The other thing that fell flat: Turnip Head’s surprise ending. For a mute scarecrow, he’s incredibly endearing throughout the movie — which goes to show just how talented Studio Ghibli is — but then is turned back into a prince who gets about 3 seconds of screentime before the credits roll. It only adds insult to injury that the movie uses those three seconds to have him resolve the Big War, just like that. 

Put together, the way these two threads were wrapped up feels like when a TV show is cancelled and the writers suddenly have to finish the show three seasons ahead of schedule. This is even more exasperating when you take into account that Howl’s Moving Castle is two hours long; there’s no reason the ending had to feel so rushed.

[howdoyousayghibli]

The Cat Returns: A Divine Escalation of Weirdness

The Cat Returns (2002) is a fantasy adventure film from first-time director Hiroyuki Morita, who had previously worked as an animator on such films as My Neighbors the Yamadas, Kiki’s Delivery Service, and Akira. 

Before we get any further, it’s time for another of my patented Introductory Tweet Screencaps™:

So there you have it — this movie is indeed delightful, from start to finish. Calling it a “spinoff” isn’t exactly accurate, though. This movie was born from the apparently very popular fantasy sequences in Whisper of the Heart.

You may remember that those fantasy sequences are only there to show us what’s happening in the book that Shizuku is writing, but people loved the Baron, so work began on an animated short that eventually was spun into an entire feature-length film, albeit a short one at just an hour and 15 minutes.

That runtime suits the breezy, fun-loving nature of the film, which is a cinematic candy bar if there ever was one. Perhaps it’s most impressive quality is how effortlessly it bounces from scene to scene and even from genre to genre.

We begin with Haru, a high school girl voiced (in the Englsh dub) by Anne Hathaway, who is essentially reprising her Princess Diaries role from just a few years prior. We see Haru wake up late, skip breakfast, not be confident enough to talk to the boy she likes, and basically be a gangly mess of a teenager. Hathaway absolutely nails it, and it only takes a few lines to be charmed by the intensely relatable Haru. 

After Whisper of the Heart’s lack of true fantasy elements, I wondered if The Cat Returns would go the same way — and after the first few delightful minutes, I was completely ready for that to be the case. However, things change for Haru when she rescues a cat crossing the street. The cats of the world begin to “repay” her for this kindness — mostly with gifts like mountains of catnip and live mice. Just like there could’ve been a whole movie about Haru’s normal high school life, there could easily have been a whole movie about talking cats intruding on her normal life — but The Cat Returns is just getting started. There’s still a miniature magic detective agency, a Narnia-esque hidden fantasy world, an extremely skeezy king, and some full-on Alice in Wonderland surrealism. 

A lot of the joy of this movie comes from how it never stands still. With Anne Hathaway’s charming Haru as an anchor, the dizzying blur of scenes, settings, and situations bring to mind one of those roller coasters where actors from the original IP follow you through the loops and dives.

Hathaway doesn’t do all the lifting, however — Cary Elwes reprises his role as The Baron, unflappable and endlessly cool, and Peter Boyle, Kristine Sutherland, and Kristen Bell all also deliver great performances in supporting roles. Of course, they’re all working with great material, as The Cat Returns boasts some of the funniest Ghibli dialogue to date. In fact, this might be the first movie I’ve reviewed for this blog that I’d classify as a straight-up comedy. 

Now. Would I call this a substantial film? Or an essential film? No. It doesn’t have a particularly emphatic or poignant message. But it’s whimsical, funny, charming, beautiful, clever, and fearlessly strange. Even if it does get just a bit bogged down in the 3rd act (in a literal maze, fittingly enough), I can heartily recommend this movie to anyone who’s in the mood to be delighted. 

Up next: Howl’s Moving Castle! I love the book this movie is based off of (and the rest of Diana Wynne Jones’ books), so I am very excited to watch this one. 

Alternate Titles: 

Not Everybody Wants to Be a Cat

Kill the Fatted Mouse, the Prodigal Cat Has Returned

Stray Notes:

oops 5 seconds in and I love it

the alarm clock!

“whatever”

Art style seems … simpler? More streamlined? I like it

I literally had to pause the movie so I could write down how much I was loving it

“cat burglar?” A++

SECRET SERVICE CATS! IN SUITS!

Uhhhhh that King’s voice/dialogue …… “babe”

Dying at how everyone agrees the baron is super cool 

“Where’s Muta?” “He’ll be fine”

Every line of dialogue is incredible 

The de-transformation scene is … rough

[howdoyousayghibli]

Spirited Away Doubles Down on Ghibli Wonder but Loses a Little Magic Along the Way

It’s the fall of 2002. A young Chase Wheatley is obsessed with Warcraft III, blown away by Spider-Man, a little skeptical about the upcoming Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets film, and he has definitely never heard of Studio Ghibli or their latest film, Spirited Away.

Luckily for me, Corey Breier’s mom had heard of them — or maybe she just took us to the movie theater and picked a random PG movie when she got there, who knows — and I got to watch a delightful movie that was unlike anything I’d ever seen.

At times, Spirited Away (2001) feels almost self-indulgent on the part of director Hayao Miyazaki, and that’s not a bad thing. Mixing the magical and mundane, flowing with ease between the beautiful and the unnerving, showcasing incredible animation and striking character design — let the man treat himself, by all means. Unfortunately, the other hallmark of Miyazaki’s work — spirited heroines who go on meaningful journeys — doesn’t quite make an appearance here.

The movie opens with arguably its strongest scene: young Chihiro and her parents stumble upon what appears to be an abandoned amusement park, only to unknowingly trespass upon the world of spirits. Chihiro’s parents’ poor decision making leads to all three of them being trapped at what we learn is a hotel and spa for spirits. This scene is a masterpiece of slowly rising tension; it becomes increasingly clear that this small family should not be where they are, and the payoff was striking enough to stay with me ever since I watched this movie for the first time, 17 years ago.

After our heroine is trapped, the movie quickly transitions to showcase another of its strengths: the inspired setting. Studio Ghibli has always excelled at blending the mundane and the magical, and nowhere does that skill shine brighter than as we explore the behind-the-scenes work of running a day spa for weary spirits.

The setting is a great way to spend time with various interesting spirits, but from the second act of the movie onward, whenever the main plot rears its ugly head, the movie suffers for it. The best scenes are tangential to the story being told — like Chihiro being tasked with bathing a grotesque stink spirit, or naively letting the ominous No-Face into the spa.

The plot, as such, revolves around Chihiro escaping her contract with the spa owner and rescuing her parents. This largely happens by way of Haku, a mysterious dragon-boy who helps her navigate this strange world. The trouble is that Haku isn’t very interesting (don’t ask me how a mysterious dragon-boy manages to be boring), but the main message of the movie seems to revolve around the “true love” between him and Chihiro.

The “love conquers all” moral simply doesn’t land — Chihiro’s romance with Haku is nonexistent, which makes it extremely weird when other characters start telling her that “only true love could have broken that spell!!” If there’s another message that the movie has to offer, I missed it. Aside from her purported love for Haku, Chihiro’s character seems to mostly revolve around her being polite, but “be polite” isn’t exactly much of a message either.

Speaking of Spirited Away’s heroine: unfortunately, Chihiro simply doesn’t measure up to the protagonists of other Ghibli movies. This is, granted, a very high bar — Chihiro is still a cut above the protagonists of many other children’s movies. But she doesn’t have Kiki’s can-do attitude, or Shizuku’s passion, or San’s strength and inner conflict.

She surpasses the protagonists of Castle in the Sky by virtue of feeling more like a real person than a caricature, but she shares their misfortune of feeling more like an excuse to explore a fantastic word than a fully-realized character. By the end of the movie, I don’t know her any better than I did at the start.

These flaws aside, Spirited Away is still a beautiful movie with a lot going for it. There’s plenty of classic Ghibli Moments™ here, evidenced by how much of the movie I remembered from my one viewing in 2001. What I did and didn’t remember actually turned out to be a pretty good indicator of which parts of the movie were effective — somehow, I managed to entirely forget about Haku’s existence, but the opening scene was seared into my memory, and I also remembered the unnerving No-Face, the many-armed Kamaji, and the abrasive-but-caring Lin.

Thanks, Mrs. Breier!

Next up: The Cat Returns, a spin-off of Whisper of the Heart! Can freshman director Hiroyuki Morita carry on the magic that Yoshifumi Kondō infused into Whisper? Tune in next post to find out …

Notes:

Why is everyone so mean to Chihiro??

Kind of like Mononoke, this movie is astoundingly gorgeous with the exception of a few moments where you’re like “oh hey you guys are still figuring out cgi huh”

The return of the soot spirits! This movie and My Neighbor Totoro definitely take place in the same universe, and Totoro has definitely taken a bath at the Spirited Away spa

Alternate Titles:

Spirited Away: Why Is This The Only Oscar-Winning Ghibli Movie?

Spirit Me Away From the Stink Spirit, Please

[howdoyousayghibli]

My Neighbors the Yamadas Sets Out to Capture That Funny-Papers Feeling, and It Sure Does

When you set out to watch every Studio Ghibli movie, you start to pick up on some of the broader patterns. For example, the two major directors of the studio each bring something distinct to the table. Hayao Miyazaki directs the kind of movies people think about when they think of Ghibli — striking young heroines, fantastic settings, a sense of wonder. It’s not a huge leap to guess that My Neighbor Totoro, Kiki’s Delivery Service, and Spirited Away came from the same director, for example.

Isao Takahata, on the other hand, directs more experimental and artistically daring films, to the extent that he doesn’t have two similar films to his name. You could be forgiven for not realizing that Grave of the Fireflies and Pom Poko came from the same studio, let alone the same director.

My Neighbors the Yamadas (1999) is yet another departure from his previous three films with the studio, and tells the story — or rather, many short stories — of the Yamada family. These many stories range from just a few minutes to half an hour, but all of them are informed by the film’s newspaper comic strip inspiration. According to Wikipedia, My Neighbors the Yamadas was Studio Ghibli’s first film “to be shot using a 100% digital process,” and the result is striking: it really does look like a comic strip has come to life, including everything from big full-color Sunday splashes to blank-background weekday three-panel gags.

Much like the funny papers themselves, the short stories themselves have highs and lows. My Neighbors the Yamadas starts off strong with the adorable young Nonoko introducing her family, followed by a lavishly animated metaphor for family relationships guided by the voice-over of a wedding speech. The digital process shines here, as we see wedding cakes transform smoothly into racetracks and cars morph fluidly into boats and numerous other transformations that I can only assume were made possible by this groundbreaking process. The speech itself is also great, equal parts encouraging and humorous.

(As an aside, I’d also like to note that, as a then-expecting parent, it was extremely nice to hear that having kids was something to look forward to, actually. If I could outlaw people telling you to “get some sleep while you can,” I would.)

If the wedding speech sequence is My Neighbors the Yamadas at its most beautiful, the following sequence is the film at its most entertaining and relatable. When the Yamadas realize they’ve left Nonoko at the mall, each member of the family gets a chance to shine, whether it’s the blustering father, hysterical mother, sharp-tongued grandmother, or either of the nonplussed children.

Really, it’s Nonoko who steals the scene — her infallible optimism and her determination to help another lost child are instantly endearing, as is her great dialogue (“There’s so many lost grownups today!”). Voice actress Liliana Mumy may not have a lot of big titles under her belt, but she absolutely knocks it out of the park here, which is even more impressive when you realize that she was only six years old at the time.

Unfortunately, Nonoko pretty much falls out of the movie after these opening scenes, and it’s a shame. There’s still a lot of humor to be found among the rest of the Yamada family, but the rest of the film is much more hit or miss, largely depending on the strength of the current gag.

The ones that work best tend to be the ones that take advantage of the animation — like a TV remote battle that’s somewhere between a dance and a fight scene, or a confrontation with some bikers that gets a lot of mileage out of a sudden switch in art style. Some of the more traditional funny-papers jokes — including too many “the dad is lazy and the mom does all the work!” jokes — fall entirely flat. Here, the short story format helps out; if you don’t like the weather, etc. etc.

Essentially, what you have is a film that wants to capture the spirit of comic strips, and it does — for everything from revered Calvin and Hobbes strips to groan-worthy Garfield “jokes.”

Up next, the big one: Spirited Away. I actually saw this one in theaters!

Stray Notes:

Odd start but dang if these characters aren’t all great

Art style only occasionally drifts into “hey this looks kinda 3D in a weird way” which is more than I can say for almost every other show/movie that’s tried it

The televised baseball game is beautifully animated, for some reason 

The animation switch with the bikers is effective, spooky

Moonlight Rider is A+

[howdoyousayghibli]

Ashitaka and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Boar

To say that Princess Mononoke (1997) has a lot going on is an understatement; as Wikipedia puts it, this is a “Japanese animated epic historical fantasy war film,” and it has a lot to say about violence, environmentalism, and imperialism.

For those who haven’t seen it, the briefest of summaries: After being cursed by a rampaging demon, young Ashitaka seeks a cure from a forest god, only to be caught up in a conflict between the forest spirits, an industrial town, and the forces of the Japanese empire.

I think there’s a lot in this movie that, even after three viewings, goes over my head — and a lot of that comes from the fact that this movie is very rooted in Japanese history and culture. In my opinion, it’s still enjoyable and valuable to people without that background, but I imagine there’s got to be something lost in translation. Before I get into that, though: is this a good movie?

Movie Good Y/N

Are you kidding? It’s Princess Mononoke. This movie is an achievement. On a technical level, the animation is astounding even by Ghibli standards. There’s one or two effects (ok, exactly two digital effects) that haven’t aged particularly well since 1997, when I’m sure they were groundbreaking, but on the whole this is a beautiful movie. Every scene is replete with striking imagery. This film represents director Hayao Miyazaki at the top of his game.

Princess Mononoke also features a large cast of fully realized characters. Like most Ghibli movies, there isn’t an obvious villain to be defeated; unlike most Ghibli movies, that’s because most of the characters are villains in one way or another. This movie really leans into gray morality and the idea that violence taints all parties involved, but that message could have come across as cynical or preachy if the characters felt like they only existed to demonstrate this idea.

Instead, the murky morality feels like a natural extension of the well-written characters. People have conflicting interests and the road to hell is paved with good intentions, and that really comes across here. If you rescue society’s outcasts and treat them like real human beings, but you put them to work in support of something terrible, are you a good person or a bad person? This is the kind of question that Princess Mononoke will leave in your brain, like a grain of sand in an oyster.

Yes, But: The Dub

Unfortunately, Princess Mononoke is not a perfect movie — at least, not in the form I first saw it in. To be blunt, the English dub for this movie is not great. You’ll find no general judgements here on the virtues of subs versus dubs, but in the specific case of Princess Mononoke, I really have to recommend watching it in Japanese with English subtitles.

Part of the problem is some odd choices in translation — even the English name of the movie, "Princess Mononoke", is a bit misleading*. A lot of the dialogue is oddly repetitive as well, with lines like “Shut up! Stop that noise! I’m trying to do accounts so be quiet!” and “Yup, I suppose, yeah.” Watching it with subtitles shed some light on things that sounded a bit odd the first time around. The shoddy translation is especially disappointing after having just watched Whisper of the Heart, which has great dialogue throughout.

However, the bulk of the reason for watching it with Japanese audio is that the English voice acting for Jigo the monk, a major role in the movie, is just awful. If you’ve ever heard someone translating live, it should sound familiar — as if they’re just rushing to keep up with the material they’re translating and have no time to inject emotion or personality. It’s made all the more jarring by the expressive face of the character; there’s a complete disconnect between his voice and his face that brings the entire movie down whenever he’s on screen.

The rest of the English cast members do as well as they can with the sometimes clunky translations they had to work with. Claire Danes in particular does a good job in her leading role as San, lending a Carrie Fisher-esque sense of gumption to the character.

Despite some localization problems, Princess Mononoke is a beautifully animated movie featuring a rich cast and complex, interesting themes. If you haven’t already, you should absolutely see it.

So, it’s a good movie. But what is it about?

Studio Ghibli Refuses to Glorify Violence

Princess Mononoke is, at times, a very violent movie. The thing is, the violence in this movie is graphic, but it’s not graphic. Princess Mononoke neither flinches from violence nor glorifies it. In the opening scene, Ashitaka does everything he can to resolve the demon situation peacefully, but he’s also clearly prepared for violence, and practiced in dishing it out. On his way to the village, Ashitaka encounters a few young women; they don't engage in the fight, but they are carrying large knives. Studio Ghibli’s not trying to sell you a world without violence, but it is trying to convince us that it is at most a necessary evil, and not something to be celebrated.

An older target audience could’ve been an excuse to go wild with fight scenes and violence; instead, the closest thing we get in this movie to a real fight scene lasts barely any time at all before our hero steps in and ends the fight as unceremoniously as possible. Ashitaka even willingly leaves his weapons behind heading into a dangerous situation; he believes that violence will only beget more violence, and that a loftier solution is called for.

Princess Mononoke literally demonizes violence. Ashitaka gets what are essentially superpowers, but he never once revels in them. He’s horrified by them, and by what he does with them. Throughout this movie, violence — whether receiving it or doling it out — turns good spirits and good people into monsters.

Like Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind, Princess Mononoke advocates for pacifism, but neither film shies away from the sacrifices required by that philosophy. Peace and trust can win the day, but you may not come out the other side in one piece. Is it worth it? Ashitaka thinks so, and Hayao Miyazaki hopes you will too.

Next up: My Neighbors the Yamadas! I have no idea what to expect from this one, folks. Isao Takahata’s films have been hit or miss for me so far, so we’ll see!

*The English title implies that Mononoke is the name of the titular princess, which led to confusion on my part when we learn her actual name, San. “Why even bother with the whole Mononoke thing,” I wondered, “if it’s not even her name and no one really calls her that?”

The Japanese title is Mononoke-hime; -hime means princess, so all good there, but mononoke is a Japanese word, not a person’s name. It refers to spirits or supernatural beings of a certain type, often a vengeful sort. Knowing this explained a lot to me — the more accurate English translation would have been something like “Monster Princess.” Mononoke-hime is a title used by the people who don’t know her actual name, because that’s what she is to them: a mononoke princess.

Now, I get why they didn’t go with “Spirit Princess” for the name of the movie, but it would have been easy to dub in a few lines explaining the term (“She’s a mononoke - a vengeful spirit!”).

Alternate Titles:

Princess Monoannieareyouokay?

Notes:

the umbrellas are so good; attention to detail, like ashitaka stringing his bow

why do the kudama have butts

the road to hell is paved with good intentions; the decisions of lady eboshi/iron town make sense individually but are awful in aggregate

looooove the apes’ voices

the regurgitation scene sure happens

and keeps happening

omg yakul is the best dog

[howdoyousayghibli]

Whisper of the Heart of the Valley of the Wind on a Cliff by the Sea in the Sky with Diamonds

I have to come clean with you, dear readers. I’m pretty unfairly biased towards this film, because this is how I experienced the opening scene:

It’s honestly hard for me to believe that this movie, made in 1995 and released in North America in 2006, just happens to feature “Take Me Home, Country Roads,” by John Denver, and that I just happened to watch it in 2018, when Country Road fever is at an all-time high after high-profile uses of the song in media such as Kingsman 2, Logan Lucky, and the Fallout 76 trailer.

Anyway, fantastic songs aside, this really is a great movie, and one that surprised me. It’s the first Studio Ghibli movie not to be directed by Hayao Miyazaki or Isao Takahata, with Yoshifumi Kondō at the helm instead and Miyazaki retaining screenwriter credit. Kondō, who was a first-time director but who had played a significant role in Kiki’s Delivery Service and Only Yesterday, really knocked it out of the park here.

In addition to having a new director, it also departs from the Ghibli norm by eschewing fantasy elements, which I did not know going in. This didn’t go over so well with me in Only Yesterday, but Whisper of the Heart tells a much more cohesive story than that movie — or than most Ghibli movies, for that matter.

Whisper of the Heart tells the story of a young girl, Shizuku, as she learns to embrace her natural talent for writing. It feels less like a short story compilation than some of the other movies I’ve reviewed, but it’s not necessarily because it doesn’t take any diversions. There’s an excellent subplot involving middle-school romances, and a lengthy (and deeply relatable) scene of Shizuku chasing a cat across town. Instead, what helps the film feel more cohesive is that each narrative thread is given a satisfying resolution.

I’m not sure yet if it’s a bug or a feature of Studio Ghibli, but many of their films don’t bother with what your average Hollywood movie would consider a denouement. It was jarring, to me, at first, to go without. The more I watch, the more I appreciate the way they stand apart from so many other movies I see, but I also can’t help it if the sense of resolution in Whisper of the Heart makes it one of my favorite movies from the studio so far.

Of course, it doesn’t hurt that this movie does continues the trend of Ghibli movies being willing to tackle concepts that are more complex than those found in your standard kid’s fare. Like Kiki, Shizuku isn’t trying to save the world: she’s just trying to figure out her place in it.

What I said about being unfairly biased towards this film goes beyond Country Roads — it would’ve been pretty hard for me to dislike a film about a kid who:

loves to read

procrastinates studying

has parents who aren’t on them as much as they should be

is insecure about their talents

doesn’t know what to do with their life

tries to make friends with stray cats

definitely has undiagnosed adhd

what is sleep??

At the start of Whisper of the Heart, Shizuku is content to enjoy her summer chasing her book-reading goal, but things change when she befriends Seiji. Seiji wants to be a violin maker and has already put in a lot of work towards achieving this goal; next to him, Shizuku feels unambitious and talentless. Still in middle school, he knows exactly what he wants to do with his life, and Shizuku has no idea.

Besides being relatable to a 26-year-old who still isn’t sure what to do with his life, it’s captivating to watch the carefree, insouciant Shizuku get fired up with the desire to prove herself. She decides to take inspiration from Seiji’s drive and write a story before he returns from his apprenticeship. Though she sacrifices time, sleep, and her grades, the movie doesn’t grant her a perfect victory. Again, like in Kiki’s Delivery Service, Whisper of the Heart doesn’t try to sell kids on a world where hard work pays off instantly, or where following your dreams is as simple as one moment of epiphany.

Besides an engaging story and great soundtrack, Whisper of the Heart also features some of the most true-to-life family dynamics I’ve ever seen on screen. At first, Shizuku’s family almost comes off as rude, but then you realize that it’s because they aren’t acting like they know they’re on camera. There’s a tendency in movies and television for family members to fit into one of two categories: caring and thoughtful, or angry and troubled. Shizuku’s family just feels … real.

In our day-to-day lives, we don’t carefully consider each word that comes out of our mouths. Yoshifumi Kondō understood that a complaint here or a nag there doesn’t always signal some unresolved family drama; it’s just how people talk when they aren’t paying attention. Shizuku’s parents are supportive without coming off as overly sweet, and anyone with siblings will see some part of themselves in her relationship with her older sister. Each family member feels fully realized, and they make a fantastic backdrop for Shizuku’s journey.

I may not have known what I’d think of Whisper of the Heart going in, but I do now: it’s one of my favorite Ghibli movies so far. I think it’s tied with Porco Rosso for Best Dialogue, it’s the clear winner for Best Family, and it’s message is right up there with Kiki’s Delivery Service. It ends on a slightly odd note, but otherwise there’s not a thing I would change. 

I guess you could say it’s … almost heaven.

Next up is Princess Mononoke, which I am definitely not smart enough to review. Good luck, me!

Check below the Alternate Review Titles and Stray Notes for the brand new, fresh-out-the-oven Spoiler Zone!

Alternate Review Title(s):

West Virginia of the Heart

Stray Notes: 

see, I can love a Ghibli movie with no fantasy elements

the theatrical poster for this movie is very misleading

“why not try dating him? If you don’t like him, you can stop!” solid advice

adhd vibes from mom and shizuku

THE FLUTE MAN

the whole jam session scene is. GOOD.

when Shizuku can’t turn off her lamp without actually sitting up in bed is the most relatable thing in any movie ever

sugimura and yoko making up and being chill is also great

all the kids’ voice acting is good, so is all the background chatter

“you got a visitor. It’s a guuUuuy!” and the class just ERUPTS, A+++

this movie is so middle school, in such a good, beautiful way

of COURSE she didn’t notice you, you idiot, she was READING

“I’ll wait until you’re done” WHAT A GUY

it’s a little corny, but you’re a violin maker, not a writer” HAH sick burn kiddo

Spoiler Zone

I especially loved how Shizuku’s dad handles her declaration of a secret project. He acknowledges that perfect grades aren’t the only path to success, but essentially tells Shizuku that if you follow your own path, it’s all on you if you screw up. It would’ve been just too sweet and out-of-character if he had simply smiled and told Shizuku to follow her heart; his paired support and warning feel more true to life.

To me, the ending was a bit weird and came totally out of left field. A lot of this movie feels very middle-school, but in a great way that makes you smile; the ending feels middle-school in a way that makes you cringe and want to forget it happened. It’s a shame the movie has to end on such an odd note; I even watched it in Japanese with subtitles on, to see if it was a translation issue. It’s not. A couple other parts of the movie are a little clearer with subtitles (for instance, it makes much more sense to have Shizuku be translating Country Roads into Japanese than just re-writing it in English), but the ending is basically the same. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

[howdoyousayghibli]

I think it’s “gib-lee” with a hard g

Surely you can’t be serious

[howdoyousayghibli]

Pom Poko: Your New Favorite Animated Mockumentary About Magical Racoon Dogs

Pom Poko, directed by the late Isao Takahata, is a 1994 film about tanuki, a species native to Japan and usually referred to in translation as raccoon dogs. It didn’t see a North American release until 2005, and today still isn’t exactly readily available. To give you an idea of the lengths I’m willing to go to for these reviews (aside from actually like, paying money), to watch this film I had to sign up for a free trial of Netflix’s yes-they-still-do-that mail-order DVD service.

It’s not a mystery why Pom Poko is less readily available than some other Ghibli films; everything about the movie draws heavily on Japanese culture and folklore, and some things are definitely lost in translation. Tanuki, apparently, feature prominently in Japanese folktales, where they delight in using their shapeshifting powers to trick or frighten the humans they live near.

The cultural divide is never clearer than in a certain aspect of the tanuki’s depiction. Judging from the Google auto-completes I encountered while learning about this film, if you have heard of Pom Poko, you probably already know what I’m talking about: this movie features

a.

lot.

of.

raccoon testicles.

(not pictured.)

According to Wikipedia, “prominent testicles are an integral part of tanuki folklore, and they are shown and referred to throughout the film, and also used frequently in their shape-shifting.” They’re not kidding, although the English dub creatively replaces “testicles” with the wonderfully ambiguous “raccoon pouches.” It’s … weird.

With that out of the way, what about the movie? Well, it’s good, but with several asterisks.

Elevated by an Unusual Format

To me, the most interesting aspect of the film — and one I was unaware of before watching — was it’s mockumentary format. When I say mockumentary here, I don’t mean the in the Parks and Rec or The Office sense of “sometimes they look at the camera,” but full-on Ken Burns–status documentary, with voiceovers, time jumps, and educational asides. I don’t know if that description would have gotten me terribly excited, but it’s actually incredibly charming. I was delighted to find that the narrator, Maurice LaMarche, is also the voice of The Brain from Pinky and The Brain; I could probably listen to him talk about anything at length.

The mockumentary style also fits the movie’s content; from the get-go, the tanuki are characterized as unambitious, fun-loving, mischievous creatures, which naturally leads to the story taking a lot of detours. This might have been more frustrating in a traditional format, but I think we’re more willing to go along with these kinds of asides in a documentary.

Memorable, Relatable Shape-Shifting Raccoon Dogs

Pom Poko’s charming format is complemented by its strong cast of memorable characters. Per usual, the character design is on-point, helping the audience differentiate between dozens of tanuki that could very easily have been indistinguishable.

A big part of the movie’s charm derives from the characters’ relatability; magic raccoon raccoon dogs they may be, but they’re also one of the most human casts you’ll ever watch. They have town-hall meetings that break down into bickering or side-discussions; they get hungry and distracted while on important missions; they can be proud and stubborn, but also easy-going and silly—after which they get mad that no one takes them seriously. The writing (and the translation) feels a cut above most Ghibli films, except for a few cases where dialogue is clearly referencing a Japanese folk tale or idiom that just doesn’t translate. The rest of the time, the dialogue endears us to these creatures and carries a lot of the movie.

Charming—For a While

Pom Poko has a lot going for it, as you’ve by now read about in detail. It’s biggest flaw is its two-hour runtime; this charming story about easily distracted raccoon dogs loses steam somewhere around the 90-minute mark. With so many asides, it would have been easy to cut a half hour or more, and I wish they had.

The ending is surprisingly gloomy; I think they were going for a Lorax-style “the rest is up to you” feeling, which could have been effective, but they kind of spoiled it by having a character look directly at the camera (for the first and only time in the movie) and tell the audience that the rest is up to us. It’s jarringly blunt and ends the movie on a less-effective note.

A Daring, Different, Distinct Deep Cut

While it may overstay its welcome, this is still a really interesting and well-made film. I wouldn’t recommend to someone just starting to explore the Ghibli catalogue, but I would recommend it if you’ve seen the hits and are hungry for more. Pom Poko can satisfy that craving, and without feeling like leftovers (looking at you, Mary and the Witch’s Flower).

Notes From As I Was Watching:

Oops it’s good

“It’s my raccoon pouch!” !?!

This movie it cute as balls (lol)

The faux documentary style works so dang well, how

Murder eh

“Leeaaave the tempuuuraaa”

Omg the transformation masters

Alternate Titles:

Having a Ball with Pom Poko

More like P o r n Poko, Am I Right?

[howdoyousayghibli]

Animal Charm: Only Porcos Have Wings

I’ve seen two movies that center on pilots, danger, and romance in the era between world wars. One is Only Angels Have Wings, a critically acclaimed film from Hollywood’s Golden Age; the other is Porco Rosso, a 1992 animated feature from Studio Ghibli, directed by Hayao Miyazaki. Only Angels Have Wings has some powerful performances and certainly deserves its accolades, but if you asked me which I’d rather watch at any given moment, Porco Rosso would win out every time. This is one of the funnest, most enjoyable films I’ve ever seen, to the extent that I had to watch it twice for this review—the first time, I was just having too much fun.

Like Indiana Jones, But He’s a Pig and a Pilot and a Bounty Hunter and There’s No Treasure and There’s More Pirates

This is one of the purest adventure movies I’ve ever seen, of a type with the Indiana Jones movies, and part of what makes this movie so fun is that every character is likeable. This is no exaggeration—the closest thing movie has to an on-screen villain is Donald Curtis, the American pilot hired to take out our hero Porco. He’s a fantastic caricature of the Roarin’ 20s Hollywood Star, and is as entertaining as he is arrogant. The only real “bad guys” are the Italian secret police, who are wisely kept almost entirely off-screen. Having the only truly villainous presence remain just that—an uncharacterized presence—frees the movie to make everyone from the arms dealers to the mechanic’s grandma memorable, likeable characters.

Here’s a quick list, off the top of my head, of characters in this movie that I loved (in no particular order):

Porco

Main pirate chief

Cowardly pirate chief

The arms dealer guy

Italian mechanic grandpa

Gas boy

Italian mechanic grandpa’s grandmas

Schoolchildren hostages

Donald Curtis

Fio

Porco’s army friend

Gina

The typewriter pigs from the opening crawl

In case it’s unclear, this is essentially a list of all the characters in Porco Rosso.

The movie also has a fantastic opening scene. The audience quickly learns a lot of important info: Porco doesn’t care about being a hero, he’s a great pilot, he doesn’t want to kill anyone, even the pirates in this movie are basically good dudes, and mechanical problems will be a recurring theme. We also get some classic Ghibli elements, like beautifully animated flying machines and precocious children. It sets up the pirates’ need to eliminate Porco while establishing Porco’s status quo.

The opening scene also introduces us to one of my other favorite aspects of the film: Michael Keaton as the voice of Porco Rosso. It’s hard to pin down, but he just doesn’t sound like I expected him to, in a good way. Through some combination of confidence, apathy, pragmatism, and dryness, Porco’s voice lends him pathos and elevates him from your average quippy hero to something truly memorable. Of course, his great dialogue doesn’t hurt either—anyone who’s seen the film will recall a certain (timely, am I right) line concerning pigs and fascists. It’s just one of many great lines, and while Porco hogs a significant number of them for himself, the side characters all get plenty of moments to shine as well.

Is there anything I don’t like about this movie?

This is a nitpick, but after watching Porco Rosso and Castle in the Sky, I feel like there must have been a conversation among the animation team that went something like:

“Hey, fistfights are when two people taking turns punching each other in the face, right?” “Yeah, that sounds about right.”

Of course, we’re not here for the fistfights, but the dogfights, so it’s not a huge issue. (The dogfights are awesome)

There’s also Fio, the young mechanical prodigy. She fits right alongside Nausicaä as a fiercely competent, fiery female lead, and I have no complaints there. It did strike me a little odd, though, how hard they hit the “uh oh! Sexism!” note. Technically, the message is positive (i.e., that Fio is as competent as anyone and Porco is being dumb), but in a movie about a flying pig, couldn’t we have just … not done the whole “she’s building a plane? but she’s a woommmaaannnn” thing? Like, hooray that she proves him wrong, but if they wanted conflict between them, it could just have easily been “dude she’s 17 can I please get an adult engineer.”

That said, Porco does get over it, and it’s not a huge issue.

The Long and Short of It

Do you want to watch a fun, clever, beautiful movie? Porco Rosso is what you’re looking for. I haven’t mentioned the beauty yet—because I hope by now it’s assumed—but it is worth noting that this is the first Ghibli film in a tropical setting (I know Italy isn’t technically in the tropics, don’t @ me). The ocean has never looked so good, before or since. Anyway, watch this movie.

Next Up: Pom Poko. It’s a weird one, guys. A good one, but a weird one. 

Alternate Title:

Gimme Gimme Gimme a Pig After Midnight

Stray Notes: 

Opening typewriter multilingual crawl 👍👍👍

Best pirates ever

Old Italian mechanic also the best (arms dealer also also the best???)

Is Porco Rosso the first marvel movie???

Cartoon in a cartoon 👍

Pretty neat to have parallax in a cartoon 

“thE PRESIDeNT”

“For my next movie, it’s a pilot, but he’s a pig!” “Miyazaki you genius, you’ve done it again.”

End credits pig children??????

[howdoyousayghibli]

Only Yesterday: True to Life, For Better and For Worse

Released in Japan in 1991 and in North America in 2016, Only Yesterday tells the story of 27-year-old Taeko as she visits a relative’s farm in rural Japan and reminisces about her childhood, specifically the fifth grade. It has the distinction of being Studio Ghibli’s first film without any element of fantasy; it also has the distinction of being the first Studio Ghibli film to really leave me wanting more.

I’ve wondered if the two are linked; not in the sense that a non-fantasy drama had no chance with me, but in the sense that Studio Ghibli had some trouble transitioning from one to the other. Several of their films that I’ve reviewed before now have had lackluster plots, but they more than made up for it with incredible animation and by infusing even the mundane with wondrous fantasy. Retaining the great animation but stripped of fantasy, Only Yesterday’s narrative doesn’t quite stand on its own.

Don’t Get Me Wrong

This isn’t to say that Only Yesterday has nothing going for it. I can’t think of another movie that so accurately captures the highs and lows, the feelings of frustration and injustice that come with being a younger sibling. Particularly relatable was a scene where, after hyping up her whole family on pineapple, which none of them have ever tried, Taeko realizes that she doesn’t really like it, but continues eating out of spite. However, this scene also showcases how the film’s slowness can be absolutely excruciating; I didn’t time it, but I would not be surprised if the family sits around the table eating a pineapple in silence for ten minutes of screen time.

It’s as if Studio Ghibli thought, “Well, this is a mature movie for adults, so it needs to be slow and thoughtful.” And sometimes that’s fine! One of my favorite shots of the movie, possibly even one of my favorite shots in the Ghibli canon so far, is a very slow shot of the sun rising over the fields that Taeko and her relatives are working in. It’s breathtaking, and the slowness makes sense. When it comes to most scenes, and especially comedy, though, many of this movie’s scenes fall flat because the timing just isn’t there—as in the aforementioned pineapple scene.

Like Writing the Dictionary in Beautiful Calligraphy

Even aside from the slowness, though, the movie still can’t be bothered to say anything. Taeko’s flashbacks contain a lot of cute, funny, relatable, and stirring moments; young Taeko is a very sympathetic protagonist, and even with minimal stakes I was very invested in her several short stories. The problem is that these stories gain nothing from their proximity to one another. They’re not even interwoven with any particular skill—why is the poor farmer kid nonexistent until it’s His Turn For An Anecdote?

At least the flashbacks are generally entertaining, if too self-contained. The present-day narrative fails to make a case for its existence. I was a little disappointed that Daisy Ridley’s performance wasn’t more enjoyable, but I don’t think too much of the blame lies at her feet; she wasn’t given much to work with. The arc for adult Taeko consists of her wondering if she should stay in the countryside, instead of just visiting, but there’s no sense of how her memories contribute to this decision. The present-day scenes do include some of my favorite shots, most of which center on the beautiful Japanese countryside, but the adult Taeko doesn’t really do anything besides reminisce.

A Beautiful, Odd, and Unsatisfying Film

In closing, and au contraire to how much of this review sounds, there’s a lot of good in this movie. If you’re a fan of slice-of-life dramas or slower-paced, thoughtful films, you’ll probably really enjoy Only Yesterday. The classroom scenes really are well done, and there’s (of course) a lot of beautiful animation on display. I even enjoyed learning a little about old-fashioned Japanese agriculture. Also? There’s some fantastic, weird music in this movie.

That all being said, I think my complaints are valid ones. They went overboard on the slow pacing, and this movie has no narrative through-line even in comparison to other Studio Ghibli movies. I enjoyed pretty much all of the flashbacks in and of themselves, but the movie as a whole doesn’t feel coherent.

  PS: I make a point of not reading any reviews of these movies until I’ve finished writing my own, so I was astonished by the critical response to Only Yesterday when I finished this review and looked it up. Not only universally positive reviews, but widely acknowledged as a masterpiece? To each their own, I suppose. I was mostly just surprised that not a single person seemed to have a single point of criticism for the film. The closest I could find to criticism was The AV Club saying “Only Yesterday can sometimes seem a little too random in what it chooses to show, but it has a cumulative power as Taeko comes to understand that the past that shaped her needn’t define her.” Mind you, this quote comes after about a thousand words of unmitigated praise.

Alternate Titles:

Only Yesterday: True to Life, in the Sense That Life Is Sometimes Boring and Lacks a Cohesive Theme

Only Yesterday, or How Long We Spent Eating That Pineapple

Stray Thoughts From My Notes:

British guy’s accent is v good, why does he have a British accent though/why doesn’t Daisy Ridley’s character have a British accent

The way they draw Taeko makes her look much older than 27, why do they bother pointing out her age so many times anyway (what is UP with her cheekbones)

“it might be better if it [a dad slapping her daughter] happens now and then”???? Hey, Mr. Ghibli, sir, maybe don’t normalize child abuse?????

So Taeko’s parents are just gonna suck for the whole movie huh

The animated puppet was GREAT

Please understand that i know there’s not a mr. ghibli, i’m just trying to have a good time on the internet and really though, why does this movie act like hitting your child is just a weird dad thing like socks and sandals