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Type: Movie
Rating: Any Age
Runtime: 111 min
Directed By Kondo Yoshifumi/Miyazaki Hayao
Produced By Studio Ghibli
Year Produced: 1995
The To Aru Kagaku no Home Theater Miyazaki Marathon... and then some... continues, despite public protest!
This is a "festival" where I sit down at spend about a week and a half watching all of the Miyazaki movies that I want to. I didn't mention this last time, but I don't have any particular interest in Ponyo.
What's still to come are:
Sunday - Princess Mononoke (1997)
Monday of Next Week - Spirited Away (2001)
Tuesday of Next Week - Howl's Moving Castle (2004)
I've already reviewed Kaze no Tani no Nausicaa, Laputa: Castle in the Sky, My Neighbor Totoro, Kiki's Delivery Service, and Porco Rosso, so if you're interested in that, then check it out... back there.
Shizuku is a typical Japanese high school girl. She gets decent grades and has a close circle of friends. Granted, she probably devotes a little too much time to a specific extracurricular activity than she should, but that's a teenage girl for you.
... It's reading! Jeez, your minds are in the gutter. It's a Ghibli movie, dammit!
That's always a bad sign.
Her friends are all members of some kind of choir/band or something. For some unexplained and uncared reason, they're doing Country Road by that dude John Denver. Only one problem though... it's in English.
So they've enlisted Shizuku to write them a Japanese version...
Yes, an armature song writer myself, I'd say you've got talent.
... but that's a side note.
The main story here is what Shizuku finds written on the library cards of some of the books that she's brought home.
... that reads as Amasawa Seiji, by the way, in case you were like me and had to read the subtitles.
So who is this "Amasawa Seiji"? What does he look like? What are his interests, his favorite foods, his hair color? And most importantly, why is he reading all of these books too?
These are just a couple of deluded questions that I'm sure were rocketing through Shizuk's head when she saw this, though she voiced only a couple.
The next day, she and her friend Yuko at their school. This is another concept that I suppose only people who care about their school success could understand... why are the school gates open on a... not school day (I don't know the actual date)?
Either way, she goes into the school library and finds a book that she's been looking around for... and guess what's on the inside of the cover?
... Donated.
Kind of anti-climactic of me, yeah?
... FOOLED (NOT!)!
The book was donated by none other than her knight in paper armor Amasawa... Seiji.
She goes outside and meets her friend Yuko, giving her the lyrics that she's come up, and Concrete Road, possibly the best song ever written in Japanese.
... But little does Shizuku know that their get-together was not just about the song, but also about (what else) love (kissy kissy).
... No, not with each other, that'd just be a little too over the top for Ghibli. Actually, Yuko has a secret crush that's only secret from the guy that she likes eventually. To make things worse, she's been asked out by another guy (oh, the drama!)
They're both baseball jocks, but the guy that Yuko's into is named Sugimura (who's in their class), a fact that Shizuku discovers when Yuko nearly has a heart attack when Sugimura starts talking to Shizuku. No, I don't know why this would freak her out so bad either, but there you go.
Yuko dashes off, and Shizuku follows her, dropping her new book and the sheet music as she does.
After a "Duh" conversation, Shizuku finally realizes what's happened to her stuff and dashes back to the school, only to find some creepy other high school reading the book.
... okay, he's not that bad actually. He's good enough to make wisecracks, and gave the book back without arguing or anything.
But then he went and said this.
WHAT, FUCKER?!
Pissed off for obvious latent-attraction reasons, Shizuku goes home and... reads some more. She also fantasizes about Mr. Amasawa some more too.
On a semi-unrelated note, Shizuku's sister who's come home after an extended leave has returned home for another unknown reason.
After a while, Shizuku's sister has her deliver their father's lunch to him at the library (he works there). So she sets off grudgingly, since almost nobody gets along with their siblings...
On the way there, she meets... a cat.
Now, I don't know where the fascination with this obviously strange cat comes from, and I don't understand why the cat didn't just scratch her face off like my old cat did to my friends (it was actually kind of funny).
Either way, at Shizuk's stop, the cat also ditches and Shizuku goes running after him, only to lose him at a crosswalk.
As she continues her walk to the library, she finds the cat again, and after violating several trespassing laws, manages to follow it into a boutique of antique collectibles and crap... and a clock with this on it...
Can you read that? It says Porco Rosso... does anyone get this? Is Porco the Dwarf?
While there, she also meets...
Zie Barron von Vaderham.
... just the Baron. I don't know who in their right mind would give such a title to a porcelain cat, but then again, I don't know why anime girls go into such a panic when the guy they like starts talking to someone they are talking too. Keep your cool, girls (although it's kind of cute. Unrealistic, and people looking for that are probably never going to get a girlfriend, but cute nonetheless).
After having a nice talk with the proprietor, Shizuku realizes that she's close to being late to delivering her father's lunch, so she dashes out of the store, inquiring if she can return again later.
Shizuku runs all the way down the stairs, a feat that is beyond many professional athletes, and arrives at the steps before the library... only to discover that she's dropped the lunch somewhere.
Just then, that guy who was reading her book back at school shows up, delivering her lunch to her before making another comment and riding off... singing Concrete Roads... good. He's been converted... or assimilated.
... and I'll just leave the rest to the spoiler section.
Okay, so you're probably wondering what's with the / in the director section.
Miyazaki Hayao didn't actually direct most of this movie. It was still written and produced by him and stuff, but actually that other guy; Kondo Yoshifumi directed pretty much everything.
It's a-freaking-live!!
Miyazaki directed the "fantasy" sequences of the movie, short though they may be, you could probably be see a little more of his style in there. Elements from Kiki, Porco, and even Nausicaa, not to mention an almost trademark freeness of camera and angles, though it's a lot easier to do when you've got people flying.
Like I've said before, the music was epic. Country Road in Japanese, not to mention Concrete Road, it just couldn't get much better. Throw in a My Love is a Stapler, a Fuwa Fuwa Time, and you've got the best anime score on Earth!
Yet again, go with the Japanese. There wasn't anybody outstanding in the English cast this time, but then again, it was a little-known movie. I didn't know about it until I researched Miyazaki to do this.
This was a pretty good show, especially if you like semi-depressing plot lines.
Yet again, go with the Japanese. There wasn't anybody outstanding in the English cast this time, but then again, it was a little-known movie. I didn't know about it until I researched Miyazaki to do this.
This was a pretty good show, especially if you like semi-depressing plot lines.
Coming up next!
Day 7: Princess Mononoke!
