On Miyazaki
Recently I’ve been watching a lot of Studio Ghibli/Miyazaki films (for those not familiar with Hayao Miyazaki, he’s an acclaimed Japanese animation filmmaker, check him out here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hayao_Miyazaki). Before this October I had only seen 2.5 of his films, Spirited Away, Howl’s Moving Castle, and part of Kiki’s Delivery Service. I’d seen Spirited Away because it was one of my favorite babysitter’s favorite movie, and so as kids we’d grown to like it. I’d seen the other two in middle school on days when our art teacher didn’t feel like having to deal with middle schoolers. And though I’d really liked all of them, I’d never really thought about how many other films Miyazaki had made. Then, in October, I watched Porco Rosso at someone’s house. I hadn’t even heard of this movie and so I wanted to look more into what films he’d made. I rewatched Spirited Away and watched Castle in the Sky at another friend’s house. She has all the movies and told me I should watch the rest. To put this whole process in perspective (if you haven’t seen his movies) is that they’re each so beautifully animated and have really odd, but almost comforting storylines. A lot of them are about environmentalism and portray humans as some dark force harming nature.
Since watching Castle in the Sky, I’ve watched three others of his films in one week, Princess Mononoke, My Neighbor Totoro, and watched the entirety of Kiki’s Delivery Service. It’s odd but it’s almost like I’m binge-watching movies instead of a TV show. Even though none of the storylines of his films are related or interwoven, the style of Miyazaki’s films are all really similar. Like I said, most of them have a pretty similar theme and a lot of his characters are similar (often the movie centers on a girl who is either fiercely independent or has to become independent). So it’s easy to watch them all kinda strung together.
It’s fairly impossible to quite explain how good they are (so consider this a serious advertisement for them). But I think one of the really beautiful parts of them are how great the quality of the story is and how beautiful the animation is. One thing I’ve really missed about Disney recently is that everything is drawn by a computer and almost 3D animated. And though Miyazaki films are really dissimilar to Disney films, one thing I appreciate about Miyazaki is how consistently good the (hand-done) drawings have been since before the 1990s. I really really miss that about animation now.
Seriously though, watch his films. I know everyone has different tastes and opinion on anything is exactly that (opinion), but I think that there are a number of things to like about his movies, and a number of them are different genres of movies (comedy, more dramatic, etc.).
Okay, normally, I hate anyone who decries the advent of computer generated animation for the sake of praising the "good ol' days", but Miyazaki is probably the best argument against 3D animation. The painstaking detail is gorgeous and something that a computer (while probably coming pretty close) would have an extremely difficult time attempting to replicate. He's so good at every single facet of creating an animated film, the characters, the comedy, the plots, the worldbuilding, and, of course, the animation itself. I think a comparable (and slightly more contemporary) animation studio to Ghibli is Laika, which has made Coraline, Boxtrolls, ParaNorman, and Kubo, which are all fantastic films and similar to Miyazaki's style, use painstaking detail in their animation, but with stop-motion figurines instead of drawings. Both Ghibli and Laika are just fantastic at worldbuilding. Even Disney at its height in the 90s (as well as today with its 3D worlds) had pretty two-dimensional (literally, because in the 90s a lot of it was just backdrops) landscapes. Which is fine, it's not a HUGE deal, but its so much more fun when you have this vast universe to explore like Totoro's forest or Howl's Castle.
ReplyDeleteI remember watching some of Miyazaki's films in Mrs. Dunn's art class back in middle school. I always admired the artistic element of his films, even though I couldn't (and still can't) fully appreciate the amount of time and skill it takes to create films like these. However, I was usually overwhelmed by the dark and peculiar nature of his films, which was very confusing, and maybe even disturbing to me. Maybe if I were to watch the films again I would have a different feeling after watching them.
ReplyDeleteI have seen Totoro, Ponyo, and Princess Mononoke. I really liked Totoro, I couldn't understand Ponyo, and Princess Mononoke really disturbed me so I never finished it. The work that he puts into each and every scene is amazing though. Although watching 2D things gives me a headache for some reason, I can appreciate the amazing visuals. There's this really awkward video where this one guy shows Miyazaki a computer-generated animation of a corpse and he gets really disappointed in him or something.
ReplyDeleteWhen I was younger, I was obsessed with Studio Ghibli/Miyazaki's films. I remember watching Spirited Away, Castle in the Sky, Totoro, Howl's Moving Castle, Kiki's Delivery Service, and Ponyo. I think I really liked all of them due to the impressive amount of detail in the music, art/animations, plot, and especially characters. All these aspects probably created some emotional tie to within me to these films as a kid that made me want to watch more of Miyazaki's films.
ReplyDeleteI should really watch more Studio Ghibli movies. I grew up watching Totoro, and I really loved the environment it created. A few years ago I saw Ponyo, and although I didn't really understand the plot it was still a very beautiful and enjoyable movie. I agree that there is a certain charm that comes with hand-animation. Although I think there are markets for both computer and hand animation, it does seem we're increasingly moving towards a CGI-only future. An interesting thing to ponder is that as computers and artificial intelligence get more powerful it's possible we'll see a return to the style of hand-animation that is computer-aided yet indistinguishable from traditional animation. I don't think this would be a bad thing, as it would enable animations to be made much more quickly while still retaining the aesthetic.
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