As we close the book on the Olympic games and honoring the great nation of Japan, it is only fitting that I actually sit down to write this review honoring Japan’s greatest national treasure. Should have had this guy light the Olympic torch instead of Naomi Osaka. I honestly wasn’t expecting too much with Miyazaki at 2nd on my review list, but I must say I thoroughly enjoyed this film, and it was such a joy to watch. Let us begin.
Opening Ceremonies
Hayao Miyazaki is the 80 year old director of dozens of beloved films and is probably the best known anime director to western audiences. Really, no one can say anything bad about the guy and he’s certainly not divisive by any means. He’s been working in the world of Japanese animation since at least 1964, but his breakthrough pieces first started around 1985 when he became the founder of Studio Ghibli. It’s the logo you see when you watch any of this shit.
Throughout the 80’s and 90’s, the dude was an absolute monster and just busted out these films and won awards left and right. He’s probably best known for My Neighbor Totoro, Grave of the Fireflies, and Spirited Away. I’m also partial to the Studio Ghibli film Kiki’s Delivery Service, which while not a classic HM original just gives me a lot of fond memories from my childhood. It’s got a witch flying around on a broomstick delivering mail to people, so there’s a lot to unpack there about what they were going for.
I decided that rather than go with Japanese Alice in Wonderland, or Japanese The Little Mermaid, I would go and watch Japanese Last of the Mohicans, i.e. Princess Mononoke.
I figured this would be a good choice since I had never seen it before (probably what I should be doing for all of these films, really), but also because this is supposedly one of Miyazaki’s major passion project films. He started drawing the artwork for it as early as the 1970’s (even though he repurposed a ton of it for My Neighbor Totoro), and it famously was the film Miyazaki sent Harvey Weinstein a katana with a note stating “no cuts” when the producer wanted to cut down the run time for US wide release (and also to remove a lot of the pro-environmentalism narrative which Weinstein thought wouldn’t play very well to US audiences).
The Event Schedule
Princess Mononoke tells the story of a guy named Prince Ashitaka, the quintessential good guy who is loved by everyone and is always trying to do the right thing. In fact, the story is so focused around him, Miyazaki wanted to name this film The Tale of Ashitaka, and was correctly talked out of that nonsense. At the beginning of the film, Ashitaka is seen riding this weird half deer half horse thing, and we are introduced to several villagers an idyllic pastoral landscape away from the drudges of modern society. The village is attached by a demon made of thousands of writhing worms, which Ashitaka is able to kill, but in the process wounds his harm and is marked by this weird dark image from the demon. The demon thereafter sheds its worm-skin to reveal that it is a boar god, a demigod of the forest, who became corrupted by a strange rock embedded inside of it and transformed into a demon. Even worse, Ashitaka is now cursed by the demon, and must leave his village to seek out a mystical forest spirit which can clear him of his affliction.
Ashitaka leaves the village, and in the process learns about the Great Forest Spirit, a creature which is a deer-like god by day and a giant Night Walker by night. We are introduced to characters from a place called Iron Town which basically looks like an industrial wasteland, as well as the samurai of the local dimyo names Asano. Iron Town is led by a ragtag band of former prostitutes, lepers and rejected samurai who work to strip-mine the local countryside to create ironworks that every other local asshole is trying to get. Meanwhile, packs of wolves and apes, both of which are able to talk, repeatedly attack the members of Iron Town in an attempt to halt their destruction of the forest. We find out that Iron Town is led by this lady name Lady Eboshi (voiced by Minnie Driver) who really fucking hates animals. She brags about being the one who fucked up that board god, and it turns out that rock inside of him was an iron bullet shot by the firearms being made in Iron Town. At this point, you should all really be seeing the messaging hitting you over the head like a hammer. We are also introduced to a girl, raised by wolves, who lives in the forest with the wolf god named San (voiced by Claire Daines). Side note, there is a monk voiced by Billy Bob Thorton. Weird choice.
Several events unfold which need not be elaborated on, but the point is that Ashitaka learns that everything is kind of grey area but it’s mostly humans who are wrong/misguided to a degree. In the climax of the film, a second boar god and his friends are killed in a battle, and the 2nd boar god is turned into another demon, who rushed to the Great Forest Spirit to cure him of his affliction. Lady Eboshi et al follow him there and cut of the head of the Great Forest Spirit, who is honestly a super chill dude who didn’t even see it coming. Turns out that’s barely an inconvenience because they put his head in a box but he turns into a headless Night Walker and just starts fucking everything up. There’s complete carnage until he makes it back to Iron Town and levels it to the ground, before Ashitaka returns the head to him. He then drops dead to the ground, regenerating the wilderness. Ashitaka agrees to help build the town, and it’s essentially a happy ending where the humans agree to try to live in harmony with nature. Real Lorax shit, loved every minute of it, and reminds me of this. I’ve honestly glossed over so many individual scenes or points of dialogue I loved about this movie, but really it’s just something that needs to be seen. I appreciated how the themes of this film were conveyed digestibly, and it was probably Miyazaki’s most adult film I’ve seen. There are straight up lepers and prostitutes running Iron town (I just thought – Jesus Theme with Lady Eboshi? Let’s put a pin in that for now), and there is this motif throughout the movie where the dark-marked arm of Ashitaka will just shoot arrows on its own in a battle and turn people into a bloody mess than in today’s day and age would get u an R rating.
Everything was awesome, Billy Bob Thorton aside. Script/Story – 10/10
Athlete Profiles
Honestly, for an animated movie there is no much to say about the acting. I thought the dubbed lines were delivered well, and everyone was believable. The actors all did about as good as I would have expected from an animated film, and oftentimes even went beyond it. In particular, I thought Lady Eboshi’s character was very well done, and there were even bits of color throughout when minor characters were introduced and commented on some of the weird mystical shit they were seeing. The characters themselves were mainly allegorical, but I thought it worked well with the plot. The struggle between San and Eboshi, as well as the grey areas between who the “good guys” were was done well, as well as Ashitaka acting as a stand in for the audience trying to bridge the gap and feeling the futility of the conflict escalating more and more as the film went on. Another side note I just remembered is that Jada Plinkett Smith played the head prostitute in the camp. Weird choice. Either way, I loved what they did here with the characters and I really don’t see what else the actors could possibly do to warrant me knocking any points off. Acting: 10/10; Characters: 10/10.
Artistic Gymnastics
The visuals were obviously the star of the show here. The way the forest was shown, with the backgrounds, interactions of the characters, shadows and nature, was incredible the entire way through. I honestly don’t know how anyone could complain about any of it. There was a part where millions of these cute little duders started appearing in the trees and rattling that was just incredible.
Even the Great Forest Spirit itself was the most bizarre yet beautiful creature they could have created for it. I think as with any of these Studio Ghibli films, the animation is the strength and even without a profound story could carry the films completely through, but this one just happens to also have a compelling story.
This is compounded by the fact that this was a pre-digital effects age predominantly, and so nearly all of these images were painstakingly drawn by hand. I believe the only thing which was digitally animated was the writing worms for the demon.
Overall, incredible and breathtaking visual style. Don’t know how you could possibly knock it. Visuals – 10/10
Please Rise for the National Anthem
The music choices throughout this film were great. I felt that the opening really set the stage of the landscape and world I was entering, and there were appropriate tonal shifts throughout. I particularly liked the sound editing throughout the movie, especially the woodland scenes and the scenes in Iron town where I really got the ambiance coming through. The rattling of the forest spirits as they slowly appeared in the scene and the volume of noise just increased and increased into a crescendo was so cool. Again, don’t even know what I could knock here. Sound – 10/10.
Closing Ceremonies
Overall, I enjoyed this film thoroughly. I loved the message, and although it was over 2 hours long it barely felt like it, I could have watched another hour easily. Every scene has enough in it to have something to write about here, but I thought I would keep it relatively short and sweet. I’m very happy I chose to watch this film, and can’t believe we are already peaking at only the second film.
Hayao Miyazaki wins the gold medal for me, because although he may walk out of my films like he did his own son, Princess Mononoke is the first, and currently only film, with a perfect score on the MD Index. Overall Impression – 10/10
We finally did it Nation. I await your backlash for this being the first perfect film I have ever anointed.
Total Score – 60/60