Messofanego
Banned
I went into this without seeing the trailer or any reviews, just confident of Ghibli quality. I took my sister to see this movie because she's had a busy week with her 12 hour shifts at the hospital and it really has put her life along with other women's in perspective for me.
First off, I should make the obligatory mention of how stunning the watercolour look is. I have seen review pull quotes mostly commenting on the art of the movie in posters, but there's so much more to this. The movie is 137 minutes, which is quite long for an animated feature. Probably one of the longest. Ghibli movies have usually felt arthouse. There usually are very little conflicts. The slow pace of each scene feels more like live-action. There isn't much action but the focus is entirely on characters and their struggles. Ghibli movies take their time rather than trying to cater to low attention spans. I remember my kid cousins finding My Neighbour Totoro boring even at 86 minutes. The cinema I went to (Odeon Covent Garden), most of the audience were adults with just one or two kids. My point about children continues at the very end of this.
People who pine for Disney and Pixar to be the saviours of animation, to be more progressive, mature, more socially relevant, have been looking in the wrong place. Studio Ghibli has been that right place for quite a while, and if movies like Spirited Away, Grave of the Fireflies (same director here), or The Wind Rises among others haven't made that obvious, then The Tale of Princess Kaguya makes that abundantly clear especially for people who have hidden hopes for Disney/Pixar. If this was somehow made by Disney/Pixar, it'd be getting awards top to bottom like Oscars for best screenplay, best acting, best direction, etc.
This is the subversive, brutal, and depressing masterpiece about women that critics of Disney princesses should be shouting about. Jabs are even made at religion. Best film of 2015 I've seen so far.
A tug-of-war scene at the beginning shows the protagonist as a baby crawling, being beckoned by young kids to come over and play where they are by their nickname for her "Lil Bamboo", and by her father by his nickname for her "Princess". That is essentially foreshadowing for the rest of the movie.
Girlhood and womanhood are explored in this fantastical period piece folktale. It's a critique on the traditional gender roles and restrictive lives that girls/women have to lead for many centuries. "Happiness" lying in a woman marrying, being seen as a rare treasure, and being property than in truly living. The mother comments that the father doesn't truly understand her happiness or even ask her. This was especially resonant to me because my sister is going through a very similar coercion towards marriage, even though she wants to focus on her career as a doctor (her second year now). We ended up bawling at many points of the movie. Loads of women and even men were tearing up in our screening as the credits rolled.
While the boys continue to play to an undetermined age, a girl is meant to change with age, be proper, be noble, move less, not frolic or dance around, and not be seen or heard. Your teeth is blackened, your eyebrows are plucked, and you shouldn't see the man before marriage but only read their love letters or hear proposals while you're stuck in a cage.
The best scene in the movie is when Kaguya runs. Reminds of Shinya Ohira's work. It's animated completely differently from the rest of the movie. The music is ominous here like nowhere else. Fast, loose, sketchy, raw emotion in animation. Frustration and anger.
There are moments of optimism and hilarity (audience laughed many times) but they're short lived when reality hits.
The Tale of Princess Kaguya essentially paints women's lives on Earth as a nightmare. You don't get to truly live. You lose freedom and agency. You are at the whims of others' wishes and happiness. There is mention of depression and even suicide. The ending can be seen as
. It's depressing as hell, possibly more bleak than Grave of the Fireflies.
Studio Ghibli movies have often been political as in they're usually about something. Most can be seen as being very environmental, and there's still a tinge of that here. Miyazaki's The Wind Rises was a lamentation on Japan among other things. Isao Takahata's work here is all about girlhood/womanhood, gender roles, marriage, loss of innocence, societal expectations, and determinism.
All of this in a movie that can be seen as aimed towards children. I don't know if it even is suitable for children or actually changes the entire paradigm of what children are usually meant to watch. If Ghibli movies were shown to kids at young ages, maybe their attention span would expand and not need whizz bang in their media consumption. They could understand a bit about the world. Especially if you show this to a young girl, because this movie is all about real life (through a fantasy lens) and the withering of freedoms that come along. We force feed our kids on happy escapist stories that have little relevance to the real world, so they don't know what reality ends up being like when they grow up. We try to keep their innocence for as long as we can, in a vain attempt to mentally safeguard them because of our condescending attitude of thinking they can't handle it. Actually, showing them movies about Disney princesses, hero journeys, and fantasy that isn't relevant to the real world is probably more likely to stunt their development than teaching them what life really is like and letting them understand that gradually. I grew up on Neverending Story, Labyrinth, The Land Before Time, James and the Giant Peach, Nightmare Before Christmas, Who Framed Roger Rabbit, and Watership Down. Those dark fantasy movies didn't pull any punches and probably helped me deal with real stuff way quicker. If anything, showing this movie might help them understand the world better.
First off, I should make the obligatory mention of how stunning the watercolour look is. I have seen review pull quotes mostly commenting on the art of the movie in posters, but there's so much more to this. The movie is 137 minutes, which is quite long for an animated feature. Probably one of the longest. Ghibli movies have usually felt arthouse. There usually are very little conflicts. The slow pace of each scene feels more like live-action. There isn't much action but the focus is entirely on characters and their struggles. Ghibli movies take their time rather than trying to cater to low attention spans. I remember my kid cousins finding My Neighbour Totoro boring even at 86 minutes. The cinema I went to (Odeon Covent Garden), most of the audience were adults with just one or two kids. My point about children continues at the very end of this.
People who pine for Disney and Pixar to be the saviours of animation, to be more progressive, mature, more socially relevant, have been looking in the wrong place. Studio Ghibli has been that right place for quite a while, and if movies like Spirited Away, Grave of the Fireflies (same director here), or The Wind Rises among others haven't made that obvious, then The Tale of Princess Kaguya makes that abundantly clear especially for people who have hidden hopes for Disney/Pixar. If this was somehow made by Disney/Pixar, it'd be getting awards top to bottom like Oscars for best screenplay, best acting, best direction, etc.
This is the subversive, brutal, and depressing masterpiece about women that critics of Disney princesses should be shouting about. Jabs are even made at religion. Best film of 2015 I've seen so far.
A tug-of-war scene at the beginning shows the protagonist as a baby crawling, being beckoned by young kids to come over and play where they are by their nickname for her "Lil Bamboo", and by her father by his nickname for her "Princess". That is essentially foreshadowing for the rest of the movie.
Girlhood and womanhood are explored in this fantastical period piece folktale. It's a critique on the traditional gender roles and restrictive lives that girls/women have to lead for many centuries. "Happiness" lying in a woman marrying, being seen as a rare treasure, and being property than in truly living. The mother comments that the father doesn't truly understand her happiness or even ask her. This was especially resonant to me because my sister is going through a very similar coercion towards marriage, even though she wants to focus on her career as a doctor (her second year now). We ended up bawling at many points of the movie. Loads of women and even men were tearing up in our screening as the credits rolled.
While the boys continue to play to an undetermined age, a girl is meant to change with age, be proper, be noble, move less, not frolic or dance around, and not be seen or heard. Your teeth is blackened, your eyebrows are plucked, and you shouldn't see the man before marriage but only read their love letters or hear proposals while you're stuck in a cage.
The best scene in the movie is when Kaguya runs. Reminds of Shinya Ohira's work. It's animated completely differently from the rest of the movie. The music is ominous here like nowhere else. Fast, loose, sketchy, raw emotion in animation. Frustration and anger.
There are moments of optimism and hilarity (audience laughed many times) but they're short lived when reality hits.
The Tale of Princess Kaguya essentially paints women's lives on Earth as a nightmare. You don't get to truly live. You lose freedom and agency. You are at the whims of others' wishes and happiness. There is mention of depression and even suicide. The ending can be seen as
death as religious figures drag Kaguya away to back where she came from and she's turned into an amnesiac zombie
Studio Ghibli movies have often been political as in they're usually about something. Most can be seen as being very environmental, and there's still a tinge of that here. Miyazaki's The Wind Rises was a lamentation on Japan among other things. Isao Takahata's work here is all about girlhood/womanhood, gender roles, marriage, loss of innocence, societal expectations, and determinism.
All of this in a movie that can be seen as aimed towards children. I don't know if it even is suitable for children or actually changes the entire paradigm of what children are usually meant to watch. If Ghibli movies were shown to kids at young ages, maybe their attention span would expand and not need whizz bang in their media consumption. They could understand a bit about the world. Especially if you show this to a young girl, because this movie is all about real life (through a fantasy lens) and the withering of freedoms that come along. We force feed our kids on happy escapist stories that have little relevance to the real world, so they don't know what reality ends up being like when they grow up. We try to keep their innocence for as long as we can, in a vain attempt to mentally safeguard them because of our condescending attitude of thinking they can't handle it. Actually, showing them movies about Disney princesses, hero journeys, and fantasy that isn't relevant to the real world is probably more likely to stunt their development than teaching them what life really is like and letting them understand that gradually. I grew up on Neverending Story, Labyrinth, The Land Before Time, James and the Giant Peach, Nightmare Before Christmas, Who Framed Roger Rabbit, and Watership Down. Those dark fantasy movies didn't pull any punches and probably helped me deal with real stuff way quicker. If anything, showing this movie might help them understand the world better.
