More Miyazaki
Mar. 12th, 2010 09:58 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
randy_byersSo yesterday I had the afternoon off due to computer difficulties at work, and I watched a couple of Miyazakis. Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind (Kaze no tani no Naushika, 1984) I had never seen before, while Porco Rosso I watched for the second time.
Nausicaäa was only Miyazaki's second feature. It's a post-holocaust science fiction story, and what I took away from a first viewing was mostly an ecological idea with an interesting twist. This world -- a thousand years after a presumably nuclear holocaust -- is being slowly overwhelmed by the Sea of Decay, which is comprised of fungus and insects inimical to human life. The areas where this ecology holds sway are eerily beautiful and give the movie much of its visual impact. Nausicaäa is a princess ruling a little pocket country that's protected from the fungus by wind, and another enjoyable aspect of the movie is the heroism, strength, and charm of her character. I'm sure this would reward watching again, as there are a number of striking touches to the action, such as the scene in which Nausicaäa and Asbel are pulled under the quicksand. There's more great flying action, with large military airships reminiscent of those in Laputa: Castle in the Sky (1989).
Porco Rosso continues to really wow me, however. It feels very different from the other Miyazakis I've seen. As other commentators have pointed out, it's the one movie he's made about a middle-aged man -- even though the man is currently a pig. More than that, however, is that it seems to have the most middle-aged, world-weary attitude of any of his movies, even though it maintains a childlike innocence in other ways. There's a very interesting tension between the slapstick humor that's mostly associated with the pirates, and the romantic melancholy that's associated with Porco and Gina and that tips over into a very profound tragic or transcendental melancholy or sense of loss in a couple of key scenes. Miyazaki's adept control over these shifting tones is amazing.
It also helps that the English subtitles are very witty. There are all kinds of puns on pigs that make me wonder if they are the same in Japanese or if somebody was working a different perspective. "A pig's got to fly," for example, is a really funny play on the idea that the very notion of pigs flying is the height of absurdity, and it comes at a point where Porco is essentially telling Gina that he will not let her concerns about his safety dictate his actions. There are other lines that just seem really smart and telling, however, such as the engineer Piccolo's quip, "You're preaching Buddhism to Buddha," or Piccolo's prayer in which he apologizes to God for soiling women's hands with the work of making warplanes. And I almost felt personally reproved by Gina's comment to the American hotshot pilot, Curtiss, to the effect that, "We know that it's possible to fall in love over and over again, but you ... can have Hollywood if you want." (Gina also gets another great line in this conversation with Curtiss: "You're stupid. I like that in a man." Spoken with affectionate contempt.)
As I said after my first viewing, I love how the background of the story is left largely unexplained and mysterious, and yet there are various subtle clues about the past strewn throughout. One of the things I noticed this time is that during the movie's most hair-raising scene, when Porco tells Fio the story of one of his experiences as a fighter pilot at the end of WWI, we find out in passing that the fighter pilot buddy of his who died two days after getting married was in fact married to Gina. Gina, we learn early on, has been married three times, and has just learned that the remains of her third husband -- who has been missing for three years -- have been discovered in Asia. Porco is there to stolidly comfort her. The relationship between Porco and Gina is in many ways the core of the movie, even though it is largely off-screen and unstated, or at least never directly addressed between the two of them. The sense we get of the love they have shared since childhood, through a lifetime in which they have not actually been together, is tremendously moving to me. Thus the ending is absolutely perfect. Miyazaki just nails it. We are left to wonder, in both senses of the word.
All this against a background of rising fascism and the loss of the innocent playfulness represented by the silly pirates. It still has that coming-of-age feel of so many of Miyazaki's films, and in the end we find out that this is a story that's been told by the teenaged mechaniic Fio, who has possibly restored Porco to his humanity with her own innocent love.
I don't know. I still haven't seen Princess Mononoke, which seems to be the one that, along with Spirited Away (which I have seen, and love), is frequently touted as Miyazaki's best. However, at this point I'm thinking Porco Rosso is up there in the top rank. An amazing film that balances joy and melancholy, playfulness and longing, mastery and loss, with incredible deftness. Preaching Taoism to Buddha, perhaps.
Nausicaäa was only Miyazaki's second feature. It's a post-holocaust science fiction story, and what I took away from a first viewing was mostly an ecological idea with an interesting twist. This world -- a thousand years after a presumably nuclear holocaust -- is being slowly overwhelmed by the Sea of Decay, which is comprised of fungus and insects inimical to human life. The areas where this ecology holds sway are eerily beautiful and give the movie much of its visual impact. Nausicaäa is a princess ruling a little pocket country that's protected from the fungus by wind, and another enjoyable aspect of the movie is the heroism, strength, and charm of her character. I'm sure this would reward watching again, as there are a number of striking touches to the action, such as the scene in which Nausicaäa and Asbel are pulled under the quicksand. There's more great flying action, with large military airships reminiscent of those in Laputa: Castle in the Sky (1989).
Porco Rosso continues to really wow me, however. It feels very different from the other Miyazakis I've seen. As other commentators have pointed out, it's the one movie he's made about a middle-aged man -- even though the man is currently a pig. More than that, however, is that it seems to have the most middle-aged, world-weary attitude of any of his movies, even though it maintains a childlike innocence in other ways. There's a very interesting tension between the slapstick humor that's mostly associated with the pirates, and the romantic melancholy that's associated with Porco and Gina and that tips over into a very profound tragic or transcendental melancholy or sense of loss in a couple of key scenes. Miyazaki's adept control over these shifting tones is amazing.
It also helps that the English subtitles are very witty. There are all kinds of puns on pigs that make me wonder if they are the same in Japanese or if somebody was working a different perspective. "A pig's got to fly," for example, is a really funny play on the idea that the very notion of pigs flying is the height of absurdity, and it comes at a point where Porco is essentially telling Gina that he will not let her concerns about his safety dictate his actions. There are other lines that just seem really smart and telling, however, such as the engineer Piccolo's quip, "You're preaching Buddhism to Buddha," or Piccolo's prayer in which he apologizes to God for soiling women's hands with the work of making warplanes. And I almost felt personally reproved by Gina's comment to the American hotshot pilot, Curtiss, to the effect that, "We know that it's possible to fall in love over and over again, but you ... can have Hollywood if you want." (Gina also gets another great line in this conversation with Curtiss: "You're stupid. I like that in a man." Spoken with affectionate contempt.)
As I said after my first viewing, I love how the background of the story is left largely unexplained and mysterious, and yet there are various subtle clues about the past strewn throughout. One of the things I noticed this time is that during the movie's most hair-raising scene, when Porco tells Fio the story of one of his experiences as a fighter pilot at the end of WWI, we find out in passing that the fighter pilot buddy of his who died two days after getting married was in fact married to Gina. Gina, we learn early on, has been married three times, and has just learned that the remains of her third husband -- who has been missing for three years -- have been discovered in Asia. Porco is there to stolidly comfort her. The relationship between Porco and Gina is in many ways the core of the movie, even though it is largely off-screen and unstated, or at least never directly addressed between the two of them. The sense we get of the love they have shared since childhood, through a lifetime in which they have not actually been together, is tremendously moving to me. Thus the ending is absolutely perfect. Miyazaki just nails it. We are left to wonder, in both senses of the word.
All this against a background of rising fascism and the loss of the innocent playfulness represented by the silly pirates. It still has that coming-of-age feel of so many of Miyazaki's films, and in the end we find out that this is a story that's been told by the teenaged mechaniic Fio, who has possibly restored Porco to his humanity with her own innocent love.
I don't know. I still haven't seen Princess Mononoke, which seems to be the one that, along with Spirited Away (which I have seen, and love), is frequently touted as Miyazaki's best. However, at this point I'm thinking Porco Rosso is up there in the top rank. An amazing film that balances joy and melancholy, playfulness and longing, mastery and loss, with incredible deftness. Preaching Taoism to Buddha, perhaps.
no subject
Date: 2010-03-12 09:25 pm (UTC)Hands down "Spirited Away" is my favorite, and i think probably the best of his work. Many elements that might be well done in another of his films all seem to come together as one in "Spirited Away." The transition of the town from daytime ghost town to night time spirit town still blows me away.
I do really like "Nausicaa," in part because he pulls off a headstrong young woman without making her obnoxious. She's an amazing heroine. But, hoo boy, is that movie completely NOT subtle about Miyazaki's thoughts on ecology. Miyazaki is not without subtlety, but when he abandons it it's like getting hit in the head. I'm also thinking here of his anti-war stance in "Howl's Moving Castle."
I do believe you've convinced me to re-watch "Porco Rosso." I wonder if my aversion to revisiting that one is the same as my inability to comment on some of your recent posts -- hits too close to something i'm usually better off not thinking about.
no subject
Date: 2010-03-12 09:55 pm (UTC)Once reason I watched Nausicaa next after Porco Rosso is because various people said that Fio was very similar to Nausicaa both visually and in character. I can see that.
And I agree that the ecological theme in Nausicaa gets a bit heavy-handed, even though I liked the linking of decay to renewal. Made me think of my compost bin, full of fungus and insects. But even though the bad guys suffer as well from being a little too obvious (which is usually not true in Miyazaki), the bad guy who is second to the bad princess has a charming fatalism about his own badness. The bad princess maybe suffered the most from being too one-note.
Anyway, Rain City Video was having a two-fer yesterday, so I picked up Mononoke as well. I'll watch it over the weekend, I hope.
I'm also going to rewatch My Neighbor Totoro and Kiki's Delivery Service as soon as possible. Much commentary seems to think that Porco Rosso and Totoro are his most personal films, with the former drawing on his own middle-age attitudes and the fact that he likes to draw himself as a pig, and the latter drawing on the fact that his mother was very sick with TB when he was a child. Aside from that, I really liked both Totoro and Kiki on a first viewing a couple of years ago.
I really like Castle in the Sky, too, which I have probably watched more than any other Miyazaki.
no subject
Date: 2010-03-13 03:53 am (UTC)Kiki is the Miyazaki character that resonates most strongly with me. Her struggle to keep up her spirits while trying to find her niche and what she's good at (not to mention her difficulty making friends her own age) speaks pretty directly to me.
Are you a Miyazaki film completist? Don't forget "The Castle of Cagliostro"! It's a Lupin movie so it's pure, silly fun. I keep questioning the plot all the way thru', which i think drives Andy nuts, but there are some nice Miyazaki flourishes in it.
no subject
Date: 2010-03-13 05:26 pm (UTC)Yes, that includes The Castle of Cagliostro (sure are a lot of castles in his titles!), which I saw at the Grand Illusion back in the '90s sometime. It was the first Miyazaki film I'd ever seen, and it didn't make much of an impression on me. I'd like to see it again now.
I watched Princess Mononoke last night and thought it had many of the same strengths and weaknesses as Nausicaa. The evil princess is probably more interesting and complicated in Mononoke, although it's odd that she loses an arm too. I still find the idea of Nature getting angry at humanity a bit too anthropomorphic. Nature doesn't get mad; it just gets even! (As in settling into a new balance.) But Miyazaki's reverence for nature creates some amazing settings, and the forest in Mononoke has a mystical beauty. It managed to make me think of the forests of the Pacific Northwest and Yap at the same time.
The thing I remember absolutely loving about Kiki was the flying. I watched it when I was sick, and it was like a flying dream, with that sense of surprising power. Well, I now have my very own copy, so I'll watch it again soon.
no subject
Date: 2010-03-15 12:17 am (UTC)If i'd realized sooner that you were renting these, i'd have gladly offered you the loan of our collection. We have all the Miyazaki films except "Ponyo." Please promise you'll ping me before you embark on any Kurosawa film binges: we bought the huge boxed set of Kurosawa that came out at the end of last year. I try to pretend i'm vaguely embarrassed by that purchase.
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Date: 2010-03-15 02:26 am (UTC)