Studio Ghibli watch progress (part II)
Studio Ghibli progress report:
Nausicaä of the Valley of the WindLaputa: Castle in the SkyGrave of the FirefliesMy Neighbour TotoroKiki’s Delivery ServiceOnly YesterdayPorco RossoOcean WavesPom PokoWhisper of the HeartPrincess MononokeMy Neighbours the YamadasSpirited AwayThe Cat ReturnsHowl’s Moving CastleTales from EarthseaPonyoArriety- From Up on Poppy Hill
So I’ve gotten to the point where I’ve watched every Studio Ghibli film that’s been released in the UK. It’s weird, there aren’t that many of them, but I feel oddly sad that it’ll be a while until I get to see any more.
Porco Rosso was cute, but really made me realise how stereotypical the main characters of Ghibli films are. A string young female lead who’s smart, good intentioned, and is going to fall in love with the main male character? But this film excelled itself in its setting, being completely different to anything from any of the other Ghibli films.
Pom Poko? Not a fan, really. The best thing that the film did was mix three levels of animation: rough and cartoon, hyper personified raccoons and realistic. Everything else about the film was less impressive. Especially the not-so-subtle environmentalist message, with the characters actually facing the camera and stating how humans should be kinder to the environment, I think. I really stopped paying attention near the end.
Whisper of the Heart was pretty good, but pretty formulaic. I mean, apart from the final scene I really quite enjoyed it. But compared to the rest of the Ghibli films it was pretty… ordinary.
My Neighbour the Yamadas was weird. It was quite nice, but weird. The scenes were rather disjoint, and it actually just seemed like lots of small skits thrown together. I thought the aesthetic style would annoy me, but I seemed to get used to it quite quickly.