Post by Admin on Dec 12, 2023 1:46:48 GMT
FILM REVIEW
DEC 8, 2023
Animal Spirit Anime
Hayao Miyazaki’s latest feature is a wondrous feat of storytelling.
www.truthdig.com/articles/animal-spirit-anime/
In the wee hours during a time of war, firebombs strafe an urban hospital. The incendiaries and accompanying sirens compel a preteen to spring out of bed and race towards the flaming building, hoping to rescue his mother.
The Boy and the Heron, Hayao Miyazaki’s remarkable anime fable, simultaneously evokes the young protagonist of Empire of the Sun and the real-life youths of Gaza and Israel. How does anyone, child or adult, endure the grief of loss and the disruptions of war?
Miyazaki, 82, is a gifted artist and visual storyteller whose enchantments, like those of the most beloved fairy tales, actively engage themes of separation, loss and death. He doesn’t make action movies about conquering enemies. He makes contemplative anime about conquering personal fears.
The film opens in 1943 Tokyo as Mahito, the boy of the title, grapples with his mother’s death. The following year, Mahito’s father moves their family of two to the countryside. There Mahito learns that he is about to become part of a family of four.
For Mahito’s father, the proximity to his aviation factory and new spouse (his late wife’s younger sister, who is pregnant) is for the better. But for Mahito, shell-shocked and motherless, the move threatens to be for the worse. The new house bustles with nosy grandmas who fuss over the newcomer (think of the seven dwarfs, but geriatric). His father enrolls him at a school where his fellow students bully him. Enter Mahito’s spirit guide, a heron that very well might be a human in a bird suit. At this juncture, Miyazaki’s shimmering, hand-drawn images and contexts take over, transporting the viewer with the beauty and logic of dreams. Miyazaki doesn’t communicate plot. His is a hieroglyphic world of signs and feelings.
rest in link.
DEC 8, 2023
Animal Spirit Anime
Hayao Miyazaki’s latest feature is a wondrous feat of storytelling.
www.truthdig.com/articles/animal-spirit-anime/
In the wee hours during a time of war, firebombs strafe an urban hospital. The incendiaries and accompanying sirens compel a preteen to spring out of bed and race towards the flaming building, hoping to rescue his mother.
The Boy and the Heron, Hayao Miyazaki’s remarkable anime fable, simultaneously evokes the young protagonist of Empire of the Sun and the real-life youths of Gaza and Israel. How does anyone, child or adult, endure the grief of loss and the disruptions of war?
Miyazaki, 82, is a gifted artist and visual storyteller whose enchantments, like those of the most beloved fairy tales, actively engage themes of separation, loss and death. He doesn’t make action movies about conquering enemies. He makes contemplative anime about conquering personal fears.
The film opens in 1943 Tokyo as Mahito, the boy of the title, grapples with his mother’s death. The following year, Mahito’s father moves their family of two to the countryside. There Mahito learns that he is about to become part of a family of four.
For Mahito’s father, the proximity to his aviation factory and new spouse (his late wife’s younger sister, who is pregnant) is for the better. But for Mahito, shell-shocked and motherless, the move threatens to be for the worse. The new house bustles with nosy grandmas who fuss over the newcomer (think of the seven dwarfs, but geriatric). His father enrolls him at a school where his fellow students bully him. Enter Mahito’s spirit guide, a heron that very well might be a human in a bird suit. At this juncture, Miyazaki’s shimmering, hand-drawn images and contexts take over, transporting the viewer with the beauty and logic of dreams. Miyazaki doesn’t communicate plot. His is a hieroglyphic world of signs and feelings.
rest in link.