"Nothing in the world is the way it ought to be. It's harsh, and cruel. But that's why there's us: champions. Doesn't matter where we come from, what we've done, or suffered, or even if we make a difference. We live as though the world were as it should be, to show it what it can be."
- Chris Bosh, NBA champion
(I once paraphrased the above, actually from the TV show Angel, to some applause in real life. I didn't mention that it came from a vampire TV show, and I omitted the word "champions." It made me wonder in what real-life context one could ever include the word "champions" and not sound like a complete lunatic, utterly undermining an otherwise solid quote.)
Saturday, July 21, 2012
Monday, July 2, 2012
Porco Rosso
Porco Rosso (1992) is easily Hayao Miyazaki's most adult film, as well as his most clearly personal. Miyazaki injects a lot of his concerns and passions into each of his films—his environmentalism, his feminism, his love of aviation—but, whereas many of his other movies seem to be about imparting to his young viewers some of his values and experience, Porco Rosso plays out more like a story he wrote to himself.
Set after World War I, Porco Rosso revolves around an Italian former flying ace, who at some point became cursed with a literal pig's face, thus earning him the nickname "Porco." The movie is unexpectedly deadpan regarding this affliction. Given that this is a Miyazaki picture, one perhaps expects some fanciful adventure to ensue, wherein the characters journey to colorful locales and endure whimsical trials in a quest to break this gypsy or whatever curse and restore him to his human form. But no, instead, when people see Porco for the first time, they at most act mildly intrigued, and then everybody moves on. And it's not as if this is some fantasy world filled with animal people; Porco's pig form is the only supernatural element in the entire story, which is otherwise more precisely set in a real place and time than any other Miyazaki movie. Porco himself does not seem too overly concerned about the curse. It hasn't affected his diet, his lifestyle, or his piloting skills. He's basically just a human being who happens to have the face of a pig, and, like it or not, the movie doesn't bother to explore the how of it.
Pig or no, Porco remains a legendary aviator, and, in between-wars Italy, he makes his living as a bounty hunter, becoming the bane of the air pirates of the Adriatic. They enlist the services of an American ace and self-styled Casanova named Curtis (ironically voiced in the Disney dub by Cary Elwes) to take Porco down. Potentially complicating this rivalry (but mostly just adding some humor at the American's expense), Curtis also has his eyes on the nightclub owner, Gina, who is obviously in love with her dear friend Porco, despite that he seems mostly dead to romance.
It's clear early on that the showdown between Porco and Curtis will form the climax of the story. Building up to that, the film's middle act is surprisingly sedate and unhurried. It's the most laid-back movie Miyazaki has ever done, without an abundance of action or events or the sorts of otherworldly sights that the director is typically known for. It is more concerned with having viewers spend time getting familiar with the characters and setting.
As Porco prepares for his duel, ordering repairs and adjustments on his plane, he is disconcerted to find the local workforce made up entirely of women, the economic depression having earlier forced all the men to relocate in search of work. Also placing the story's setting is a subplot that has Porco having to evade the Italian secret police because he is not on board with the new Fascist regime. And probably my favorite scene occurs when Porco and an old war buddy still in the service meet inside a movie theater. As they talk, the projector plays a slapstick black-and-white cartoon seemingly inspired by Betty Boop and early Mickey Mouse. Porco and his friend's respective assessments of the cartoon are classic, and I'm guessing Miyazaki himself would probably agree with both of them.
Porco Rosso does have its share of breathtaking moments as well. In today's context, where news about "the war" conjures images of drones pounding the Middle East, the kind of aerial combat featured in Porco Rosso is already almost unimaginable. When Porco recounts a particularly grim episode from his dogfighting during the war, the flashback is presented with a muted delicacy that further imbues the scene with an eerie surrealism, as each side's fighters first form up with precision and grace, then meet in a balletic dance that seems almost choreographed. When the first plane bursts into flames and goes down, one comprehends it as in a dream. Intellectually, you understand what has happened. And yet the scene, of these machines circling far above mankind's natural dwelling place, and as unresistingly fragile as they are unrepentantly destructive, remains just slightly isolated from sensory reality. To try to resolve this dissonance is to confront some innate madness of war, or maybe even just mortality.
And perhaps that is where the film offers some clue as to why Porco became a pig. Living alone in a tent on an island, a burned-out and world-weary Bogart-esque cynic—in fact, the entire movie is designed to be as close as you'll find to a cartoon Casablanca—the mercenary Porco is unlike any other Miyazaki protagonist yet, in a way, perhaps more thoroughly Miyazaki than all the others. The implication is that, during the war, Porco experienced something horrible that changed the way he saw the world, and that change has manifested physically in his taking on a pig form, thereby changing, in turn, the way the world sees him.
Miyazaki never was a soldier, but there is little doubt that Porco is a self-portrait of the director himself. In interviews with the man, what's consistently apparent is his negativity toward this age we live in. He's down on the state of the Japanese animation industry, down on how Japan is raising its youth, down on society in general, kinda just down on everything. It's an odd attitude for a director best known for films that seemingly cater to a romantic worldview. The man and his work appear in conflict. I wonder if this tension troubles him. Porco Rosso suggests that it does.
Nearly all his protagonists are youngsters, still spirited and optimistic. Perhaps they too are self-portraits of a sort—reflections of his own worldview at that age. But Porco is the only one who is truly middle-aged, as Miyazaki himself was when he wrote this story. What we see in Porco is a realist with not a lot of faith in humanity. Yet we also get the sense that he was not always this way. No, obviously he did not begin life already disillusioned; that's something that can only come with age and experience. Whether it must come with age and experience is debatable, but that it happened to Miyazaki is certain, and perhaps a part of him sees that as regrettable. No doubt, it's not easy to live with what you've become, when you can still remember how much nicer the world used to look. And thus, while Porco himself shows no desire to return to human form, nevertheless the film's heroines, Gina and the spunky young mechanic Fio, root for his curse to be broken—essentially, for him to regain his hopefulness and vigor for life. Whether Miyazaki roots for that is hard to determine. I don't think the movie intends for Porco's happy ending to be conditional upon his regaining his human form, but maybe that's just my own interpretation through a lens of contented disillusionment. But Fio especially—clearly in the lineage of Nausicaa—seems inserted into the movie specifically to argue on behalf of the part of Miyazaki that does still hope. Yes, it's as though a struggle between two aspects of Miyazaki is playing out within a movie to serve as a message from the director to himself. Fascinating.
Following the more youth-oriented Kiki's Delivery Service, Porco Rosso comes across as Miyazaki pausing in a moment of self-reflection to consider his own stage of life. It's not too serious a survey—he did give himself a pig's head, after all—but thoughtful and honest, self-indulgent yet humble. And, after watching it, I feel like I know and appreciate the man behind the movies better.
Set after World War I, Porco Rosso revolves around an Italian former flying ace, who at some point became cursed with a literal pig's face, thus earning him the nickname "Porco." The movie is unexpectedly deadpan regarding this affliction. Given that this is a Miyazaki picture, one perhaps expects some fanciful adventure to ensue, wherein the characters journey to colorful locales and endure whimsical trials in a quest to break this gypsy or whatever curse and restore him to his human form. But no, instead, when people see Porco for the first time, they at most act mildly intrigued, and then everybody moves on. And it's not as if this is some fantasy world filled with animal people; Porco's pig form is the only supernatural element in the entire story, which is otherwise more precisely set in a real place and time than any other Miyazaki movie. Porco himself does not seem too overly concerned about the curse. It hasn't affected his diet, his lifestyle, or his piloting skills. He's basically just a human being who happens to have the face of a pig, and, like it or not, the movie doesn't bother to explore the how of it.
Pig or no, Porco remains a legendary aviator, and, in between-wars Italy, he makes his living as a bounty hunter, becoming the bane of the air pirates of the Adriatic. They enlist the services of an American ace and self-styled Casanova named Curtis (ironically voiced in the Disney dub by Cary Elwes) to take Porco down. Potentially complicating this rivalry (but mostly just adding some humor at the American's expense), Curtis also has his eyes on the nightclub owner, Gina, who is obviously in love with her dear friend Porco, despite that he seems mostly dead to romance.
It's clear early on that the showdown between Porco and Curtis will form the climax of the story. Building up to that, the film's middle act is surprisingly sedate and unhurried. It's the most laid-back movie Miyazaki has ever done, without an abundance of action or events or the sorts of otherworldly sights that the director is typically known for. It is more concerned with having viewers spend time getting familiar with the characters and setting.
As Porco prepares for his duel, ordering repairs and adjustments on his plane, he is disconcerted to find the local workforce made up entirely of women, the economic depression having earlier forced all the men to relocate in search of work. Also placing the story's setting is a subplot that has Porco having to evade the Italian secret police because he is not on board with the new Fascist regime. And probably my favorite scene occurs when Porco and an old war buddy still in the service meet inside a movie theater. As they talk, the projector plays a slapstick black-and-white cartoon seemingly inspired by Betty Boop and early Mickey Mouse. Porco and his friend's respective assessments of the cartoon are classic, and I'm guessing Miyazaki himself would probably agree with both of them.
Porco Rosso does have its share of breathtaking moments as well. In today's context, where news about "the war" conjures images of drones pounding the Middle East, the kind of aerial combat featured in Porco Rosso is already almost unimaginable. When Porco recounts a particularly grim episode from his dogfighting during the war, the flashback is presented with a muted delicacy that further imbues the scene with an eerie surrealism, as each side's fighters first form up with precision and grace, then meet in a balletic dance that seems almost choreographed. When the first plane bursts into flames and goes down, one comprehends it as in a dream. Intellectually, you understand what has happened. And yet the scene, of these machines circling far above mankind's natural dwelling place, and as unresistingly fragile as they are unrepentantly destructive, remains just slightly isolated from sensory reality. To try to resolve this dissonance is to confront some innate madness of war, or maybe even just mortality.
And perhaps that is where the film offers some clue as to why Porco became a pig. Living alone in a tent on an island, a burned-out and world-weary Bogart-esque cynic—in fact, the entire movie is designed to be as close as you'll find to a cartoon Casablanca—the mercenary Porco is unlike any other Miyazaki protagonist yet, in a way, perhaps more thoroughly Miyazaki than all the others. The implication is that, during the war, Porco experienced something horrible that changed the way he saw the world, and that change has manifested physically in his taking on a pig form, thereby changing, in turn, the way the world sees him.
Miyazaki never was a soldier, but there is little doubt that Porco is a self-portrait of the director himself. In interviews with the man, what's consistently apparent is his negativity toward this age we live in. He's down on the state of the Japanese animation industry, down on how Japan is raising its youth, down on society in general, kinda just down on everything. It's an odd attitude for a director best known for films that seemingly cater to a romantic worldview. The man and his work appear in conflict. I wonder if this tension troubles him. Porco Rosso suggests that it does.
Nearly all his protagonists are youngsters, still spirited and optimistic. Perhaps they too are self-portraits of a sort—reflections of his own worldview at that age. But Porco is the only one who is truly middle-aged, as Miyazaki himself was when he wrote this story. What we see in Porco is a realist with not a lot of faith in humanity. Yet we also get the sense that he was not always this way. No, obviously he did not begin life already disillusioned; that's something that can only come with age and experience. Whether it must come with age and experience is debatable, but that it happened to Miyazaki is certain, and perhaps a part of him sees that as regrettable. No doubt, it's not easy to live with what you've become, when you can still remember how much nicer the world used to look. And thus, while Porco himself shows no desire to return to human form, nevertheless the film's heroines, Gina and the spunky young mechanic Fio, root for his curse to be broken—essentially, for him to regain his hopefulness and vigor for life. Whether Miyazaki roots for that is hard to determine. I don't think the movie intends for Porco's happy ending to be conditional upon his regaining his human form, but maybe that's just my own interpretation through a lens of contented disillusionment. But Fio especially—clearly in the lineage of Nausicaa—seems inserted into the movie specifically to argue on behalf of the part of Miyazaki that does still hope. Yes, it's as though a struggle between two aspects of Miyazaki is playing out within a movie to serve as a message from the director to himself. Fascinating.
Following the more youth-oriented Kiki's Delivery Service, Porco Rosso comes across as Miyazaki pausing in a moment of self-reflection to consider his own stage of life. It's not too serious a survey—he did give himself a pig's head, after all—but thoughtful and honest, self-indulgent yet humble. And, after watching it, I feel like I know and appreciate the man behind the movies better.
Friday, June 29, 2012
Inspirational Quote of the Moment #3
"The Lord will surely not judge you, but I shall. Guilty of being a man, when we should have been gods!"
- Eve
- Eve
Hey Katie
Sorry to hear things didn't work out with Tom. Anything you need, just let me-
Oh wait, I don't bloody know you people.
(Context: Coworker announces that Katie Holmes is filing for divorce. He's glad, says, "She deserves better." I wouldn't know.)
Oh wait, I don't bloody know you people.
(Context: Coworker announces that Katie Holmes is filing for divorce. He's glad, says, "She deserves better." I wouldn't know.)
Sunday, June 17, 2012
Only Yesterday
To date, Isao Takahata's Only Yesterday (1991) is the only theatrical Studio Ghibli feature yet to receive (or be scheduled for) an English-language dub or US release. During a Q&A back in 2005, Disney's Rick Dempsey, who directed a number of the English dubs of Ghibli films, explained that the adaptation had been shelved indefinitely because the original movie was more for adults, and if and when it did get a US release, it might be subtitled-only. This surprised me, considering that Disney found a way to bring over Pom Poko (1994), despite it featuring tanuki testicles on display for pretty much the entire movie. I didn't think any Ghibli movie could pose more of a marketing challenge for Disney than that one (well, except for Grave of the Fireflies, which Disney never had the rights to anyway). But maybe it's because of the lengthy episode centered on menstruation, or maybe it's that the father comes off abusive in one scene. Or maybe Only Yesterday just wouldn't be that compelling to Disney's target demographic of children. Whatever the case, it's a shame that this film remains unavailable in the US. I was able to view it when Turner Classic Movies aired a subtitled version in 2006, despite it not having an official US release. What I found was an unforgettable movie unlike any other Ghibli had ever done, unlike anything else I had ever seen in animation.
Based on a manga by Hotaru Okamoto and Yuko Tone, Only Yesterday tells the story of Taeko, a single woman working in Tokyo, who, while vacationing in the countryside, finds herself flashing back to memories from when she was in the fifth grade. The original manga was a compilation of episodes about only the child Taeko, but the movie shifts back and forth between the adult Taeko in 1982 and the flashbacks set in 1966.
In either setting, moments are drawn and discussed with a delicate realism seldom seen in animation. Takahata devotes time and startling attention to detail to such simple scenes as characters eating pineapple or picking safflower. If you were one to count cels, then you might regard his allotting so many to realizing such mundane moments to be a wasteful expenditure of labor and run time. And yet, where seeing the Catbus in Miyazaki's My Neighbor Totoro may have made me think, “I've never seen anything like this before,” these meditative sequences in Only Yesterday, though much the opposite of the Catbus, nevertheless evoked in me a similar reaction of “I didn't know you could do that in animation.” Indeed, these quiet, reflective scenes, for all their simplicity, have a mood and a power to them that you'll find almost nowhere else in the medium.
The flashbacks contain occasional whimsical flourishes, as when a blushing Taeko's emotional state, following her first awkward romantic experience, is illustrated by her rushing off in the direction of the drawn background, but then, without missing a step, seemingly running along the surface of the animation cel itself, her feet lifting off the painted road, before she then proceeds to swim through the clouds toward sleep and dream. These touches charmingly depict the way a child's imagination can warp reality, as well as how the memories of childhood can be further tinted by nostalgia looking back.
The memories themselves are slices of life, not dramatic turning points. The flashbacks come to Taeko as she approaches a crossroads in her as yet unfulfilled adult life, but we are not meant to understand that her tenth year was her most pivotal, when this or that wrong turn or fateful decision determined the trajectory of the rest of her life. My favorite part of the movie comes when child Taeko is overjoyed to be offered an acting gig, only to have her own father forbid her going into showbiz. Cutting back to the present, Taeko's friends, having heard her tell the story, remark on the cruelty of her father to stand in the way of her dreams. But then Taeko reminds them and us that a whole seventeen years passed between then and now, and, in high school, she did try acting, only to find that it wasn't for her. But if it ultimately didn't shape the outcome of her life, then why was this memory featured for our consideration above, say, one from her high school attempt at acting?
Perhaps a memory doesn't have to be especially consequential in order to be personally meaningful. And, to be sure, Takahata's approach is, above all else, deeply personal. Some lengthy asides about organic farming notwithstanding, Takahata's movie is brimming with humanity. Now close in age to the adult Taeko, I find myself easily able to identify with the character at both stages depicted. I don't mean the details, but the awkwardness, the loneliness, the restlessness that she reveals upon self-reflection—it all rings so true, as do memories that poignantly blend nostalgia and embarrassment.
Reflecting on my own ten-year-old self, what I remember are footraces and essay contests, ice cream socials and Drug Abuse Resistance Education, and the time I should have gotten at least a triple in softball but was instead called out for throwing the bat. Looking at my life now, does any of that stuff still matter? These experiences have never helped me land a job or a wife or, really, anything else beyond the moments themselves. To that extent, they certainly haven't defined who I am. And yet, looking at it another way, those memories are no less my story than any others in my life. I look back and think that maybe those moments did reveal who I was and am, not by defining me, but by how I defined them. At least, for whatever reason, they have stuck with me. I can recall them clearly and still feel now as I did in the moments, as if it were all only yesterday.
Based on a manga by Hotaru Okamoto and Yuko Tone, Only Yesterday tells the story of Taeko, a single woman working in Tokyo, who, while vacationing in the countryside, finds herself flashing back to memories from when she was in the fifth grade. The original manga was a compilation of episodes about only the child Taeko, but the movie shifts back and forth between the adult Taeko in 1982 and the flashbacks set in 1966.
In either setting, moments are drawn and discussed with a delicate realism seldom seen in animation. Takahata devotes time and startling attention to detail to such simple scenes as characters eating pineapple or picking safflower. If you were one to count cels, then you might regard his allotting so many to realizing such mundane moments to be a wasteful expenditure of labor and run time. And yet, where seeing the Catbus in Miyazaki's My Neighbor Totoro may have made me think, “I've never seen anything like this before,” these meditative sequences in Only Yesterday, though much the opposite of the Catbus, nevertheless evoked in me a similar reaction of “I didn't know you could do that in animation.” Indeed, these quiet, reflective scenes, for all their simplicity, have a mood and a power to them that you'll find almost nowhere else in the medium.
The flashbacks contain occasional whimsical flourishes, as when a blushing Taeko's emotional state, following her first awkward romantic experience, is illustrated by her rushing off in the direction of the drawn background, but then, without missing a step, seemingly running along the surface of the animation cel itself, her feet lifting off the painted road, before she then proceeds to swim through the clouds toward sleep and dream. These touches charmingly depict the way a child's imagination can warp reality, as well as how the memories of childhood can be further tinted by nostalgia looking back.
The memories themselves are slices of life, not dramatic turning points. The flashbacks come to Taeko as she approaches a crossroads in her as yet unfulfilled adult life, but we are not meant to understand that her tenth year was her most pivotal, when this or that wrong turn or fateful decision determined the trajectory of the rest of her life. My favorite part of the movie comes when child Taeko is overjoyed to be offered an acting gig, only to have her own father forbid her going into showbiz. Cutting back to the present, Taeko's friends, having heard her tell the story, remark on the cruelty of her father to stand in the way of her dreams. But then Taeko reminds them and us that a whole seventeen years passed between then and now, and, in high school, she did try acting, only to find that it wasn't for her. But if it ultimately didn't shape the outcome of her life, then why was this memory featured for our consideration above, say, one from her high school attempt at acting?
Perhaps a memory doesn't have to be especially consequential in order to be personally meaningful. And, to be sure, Takahata's approach is, above all else, deeply personal. Some lengthy asides about organic farming notwithstanding, Takahata's movie is brimming with humanity. Now close in age to the adult Taeko, I find myself easily able to identify with the character at both stages depicted. I don't mean the details, but the awkwardness, the loneliness, the restlessness that she reveals upon self-reflection—it all rings so true, as do memories that poignantly blend nostalgia and embarrassment.
Reflecting on my own ten-year-old self, what I remember are footraces and essay contests, ice cream socials and Drug Abuse Resistance Education, and the time I should have gotten at least a triple in softball but was instead called out for throwing the bat. Looking at my life now, does any of that stuff still matter? These experiences have never helped me land a job or a wife or, really, anything else beyond the moments themselves. To that extent, they certainly haven't defined who I am. And yet, looking at it another way, those memories are no less my story than any others in my life. I look back and think that maybe those moments did reveal who I was and am, not by defining me, but by how I defined them. At least, for whatever reason, they have stuck with me. I can recall them clearly and still feel now as I did in the moments, as if it were all only yesterday.
Saturday, June 9, 2012
Avengers
It was good. Dialogue was sharp, funnier than I expected. As a spectacle movie, it ends up feeling like a lightweight Transformers, never near as exciting as Michael Bay's trilogy (although also never near as obnoxious).
After the opening action sequence, in which Loki single-handedly wrecks S.H.I.E.L.D., I think Nick Fury says something along the lines of "This is a level 7," immediately prompting whispers in the audience about what would constitute a level 9 or 10. The situation does later escalate, but, even at the movie's biggest action sequences, "level 7" sounds about accurate by my scale. I was not even convinced that Thor by himself was ever quite having to give 100 percent. The cannon fodder aliens seemed no more dangerous than the entirely earthly threats of Iron Man 2. And Captain America was totally useless.
Mark Ruffalo was good as Bruce Banner, although, the way the Tony Stark character has been conceived as an uber-genius in these movies, one wonders why the team would ever need any other scientists. I can see that Hank Pym (AKA Ant-Man) would have been redundant here, but I still hope he and the Wasp are in the next one. And, no, he's not just a guy that turns small and talks to ants; he also has expertise in robotics and AI, and he created Ultron, one of the villains that I personally would most want to see as the heavy in an Avengers movie.
After the opening action sequence, in which Loki single-handedly wrecks S.H.I.E.L.D., I think Nick Fury says something along the lines of "This is a level 7," immediately prompting whispers in the audience about what would constitute a level 9 or 10. The situation does later escalate, but, even at the movie's biggest action sequences, "level 7" sounds about accurate by my scale. I was not even convinced that Thor by himself was ever quite having to give 100 percent. The cannon fodder aliens seemed no more dangerous than the entirely earthly threats of Iron Man 2. And Captain America was totally useless.
Mark Ruffalo was good as Bruce Banner, although, the way the Tony Stark character has been conceived as an uber-genius in these movies, one wonders why the team would ever need any other scientists. I can see that Hank Pym (AKA Ant-Man) would have been redundant here, but I still hope he and the Wasp are in the next one. And, no, he's not just a guy that turns small and talks to ants; he also has expertise in robotics and AI, and he created Ultron, one of the villains that I personally would most want to see as the heavy in an Avengers movie.
Sunday, June 3, 2012
Kiki's Delivery Service
Kiki's Delivery Service (1989) was the first Studio Ghibli movie that Disney localized for American audiences. The English version, arriving on VHS in 1998, was a surprise hit, selling over a million copies, and it also played regularly on the Disney Channel. Accordingly, it was also the first Ghibli and Miyazaki movie that I ever watched. At the time, I didn't really like it. It seemed to be a movie about not much in particular, where not a lot happened of any consequence. Watching it again, I now think it's probably my favorite of the Miyazaki films I've covered thus far.
In a departure from his previous Ghibli productions, Kiki's Delivery Service was not an original story by Hayao Miyazaki, but rather based on a popular 1985 children's novel by Eiko Kadono. Miyazaki also did not originally plan to direct it himself, as he was still busy with My Neighbor Totoro (1988) when production began. Dissatisfied with the staff's progress, however, Miyazaki finally ended up writing and directing Kiki himself, and the result was a film that bore many of his hallmarks yet still felt distinct from his previous works. Up to this point, Miyazaki had done a post-apocalyptic epic, a romantic boys' adventure, and a children's storybook movie. Kiki's Delivery Service, meanwhile, was a coming-of-age tale, with slice-of-life elements.
The story is about Kiki, a 13-year-old witch, who, at the beginning of the film, moves to the big city to live on her own for a year, as part of a customary rite of passage for young witches. By witch standards, she's not very talented, but, after a rough start, she decides to take advantage of her flying skills to operate a delivery service out of a friendly couple's bakery.
The movie's second act then consists of episodes of her settling in, running around town and meeting new people on the job. These were the parts that I originally found dull, probably because there never seemed anything much at stake. Also, most of the people Kiki met just seemed too nice to believe. Shouldn't there have been at least one cynical character always doubting her ability to make it on her own, advising her to give up and run on back home, maybe even working actively toward seeing her fail? There really isn't any antagonist whatsoever in Kiki's Delivery Service.
In the movie, the episodes are tied together within an overarching narrative with adolescent themes of Kiki trying to find her place and herself, but it's easy to imagine each delivery as a short story with its own tidy resolution. They're kind of cute, kind of sweet, and kind of funny. After a long week of work and not much else, I actually found these chapters, slight as they are, quite refreshing. Similarly, I didn't mind the lack of any serious conflict. My favorite scene in the whole movie is when Kiki, coming back from an errand, finds a lovingly designed wreath of bread unexpectedly at the front of the bakery advertising her delivery service. With no dialogue audible, she rushes in to embrace the taciturn baker who crafted it. It's a small scene and maybe a small, inconsequential moment in the grand scheme of the movie. Or maybe it's small moments like these that make one's day and, ultimately, one's life.
No, there isn't a whole lot at stake through most of Kiki's Delivery Service, but I guess, to me, that actually lends the story credibility, despite that it stars a witch and takes place in an imaginary idealized European seaside town—by the way, one of the most gorgeously realized fictional settings in any film. It's real enough to believe but still fake enough to enjoy. I apologize if that came across cynical, but I only mean that watching Kiki is like getting a glimpse at what real life ought to be, maybe what it can be, indeed what it has been at its best.
It probably helps things that Kiki herself is much easier to relate to as a character than previous Miyazaki protagonists. More fallibly human than Nausicaa, she's clumsy, she can be shallow and superficial, she gets frustrated and even bored. Indeed, that last is maybe the most charmingly realistic aspect of Kiki's Delivery Service—the way it gets life's doldrums. As Kiki starts to settle into life's routine is when she starts to wonder what it's all about and whether there's more.
Kiki's Delivery Service is not all a laid-back series of vignettes. When Kiki is invited to ride on the backseat of a human-powered aircraft—basically a bicycle with propeller—the result is one of the more exciting sequences in Ghibli history. And the climactic scene involving a rescue from a crashed dirigible ranks up there with any superhero movie action sequence.
Kiki's Delivery Service is more involved than My Neighbor Totoro, but no less heartwarming. It's not only sweet but also a thoughtful movie for adolescents. As Kiki learns, independence is not just about fending for yourself, but about finding an identity apart from where you came from and what you've been given. And, although it may feel smaller than Nausicaa or Laputa, in that way it teaches us to reflect on the nice little moments in our small lives, which, at the end of the day, is all that most of us have.
In a departure from his previous Ghibli productions, Kiki's Delivery Service was not an original story by Hayao Miyazaki, but rather based on a popular 1985 children's novel by Eiko Kadono. Miyazaki also did not originally plan to direct it himself, as he was still busy with My Neighbor Totoro (1988) when production began. Dissatisfied with the staff's progress, however, Miyazaki finally ended up writing and directing Kiki himself, and the result was a film that bore many of his hallmarks yet still felt distinct from his previous works. Up to this point, Miyazaki had done a post-apocalyptic epic, a romantic boys' adventure, and a children's storybook movie. Kiki's Delivery Service, meanwhile, was a coming-of-age tale, with slice-of-life elements.
The story is about Kiki, a 13-year-old witch, who, at the beginning of the film, moves to the big city to live on her own for a year, as part of a customary rite of passage for young witches. By witch standards, she's not very talented, but, after a rough start, she decides to take advantage of her flying skills to operate a delivery service out of a friendly couple's bakery.
The movie's second act then consists of episodes of her settling in, running around town and meeting new people on the job. These were the parts that I originally found dull, probably because there never seemed anything much at stake. Also, most of the people Kiki met just seemed too nice to believe. Shouldn't there have been at least one cynical character always doubting her ability to make it on her own, advising her to give up and run on back home, maybe even working actively toward seeing her fail? There really isn't any antagonist whatsoever in Kiki's Delivery Service.
In the movie, the episodes are tied together within an overarching narrative with adolescent themes of Kiki trying to find her place and herself, but it's easy to imagine each delivery as a short story with its own tidy resolution. They're kind of cute, kind of sweet, and kind of funny. After a long week of work and not much else, I actually found these chapters, slight as they are, quite refreshing. Similarly, I didn't mind the lack of any serious conflict. My favorite scene in the whole movie is when Kiki, coming back from an errand, finds a lovingly designed wreath of bread unexpectedly at the front of the bakery advertising her delivery service. With no dialogue audible, she rushes in to embrace the taciturn baker who crafted it. It's a small scene and maybe a small, inconsequential moment in the grand scheme of the movie. Or maybe it's small moments like these that make one's day and, ultimately, one's life.
No, there isn't a whole lot at stake through most of Kiki's Delivery Service, but I guess, to me, that actually lends the story credibility, despite that it stars a witch and takes place in an imaginary idealized European seaside town—by the way, one of the most gorgeously realized fictional settings in any film. It's real enough to believe but still fake enough to enjoy. I apologize if that came across cynical, but I only mean that watching Kiki is like getting a glimpse at what real life ought to be, maybe what it can be, indeed what it has been at its best.
It probably helps things that Kiki herself is much easier to relate to as a character than previous Miyazaki protagonists. More fallibly human than Nausicaa, she's clumsy, she can be shallow and superficial, she gets frustrated and even bored. Indeed, that last is maybe the most charmingly realistic aspect of Kiki's Delivery Service—the way it gets life's doldrums. As Kiki starts to settle into life's routine is when she starts to wonder what it's all about and whether there's more.
Kiki's Delivery Service is not all a laid-back series of vignettes. When Kiki is invited to ride on the backseat of a human-powered aircraft—basically a bicycle with propeller—the result is one of the more exciting sequences in Ghibli history. And the climactic scene involving a rescue from a crashed dirigible ranks up there with any superhero movie action sequence.
Kiki's Delivery Service is more involved than My Neighbor Totoro, but no less heartwarming. It's not only sweet but also a thoughtful movie for adolescents. As Kiki learns, independence is not just about fending for yourself, but about finding an identity apart from where you came from and what you've been given. And, although it may feel smaller than Nausicaa or Laputa, in that way it teaches us to reflect on the nice little moments in our small lives, which, at the end of the day, is all that most of us have.
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