Howl's Moving Castle
Aug. 7th, 2005 01:46 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
furtechCut to prevent spoilerage!
I enjoyed the film, as I expected, but it's not one of my favorite Miyazaki films. The characters didn't seem as smoothly developed as in his previous films and the pacing was stiffer, like it felt constrained to follow the pace of the novel it was based on. I didn't see any reasons to like the main character: no endearing quirks, no insightful actions. And her love for Howl (and vice versa) seemed to be assumed or even come out of nowhere (I was a bit surprised at this at the end of the film). The "true love" bit with the scarecrow was even more out of left field! Still, I didn't feel like I'd wasted my time and was happy to have seen it on the big screen. I really wish I'd been able to see "Spirited Away" on the big screen!
I enjoyed the film, as I expected, but it's not one of my favorite Miyazaki films. The characters didn't seem as smoothly developed as in his previous films and the pacing was stiffer, like it felt constrained to follow the pace of the novel it was based on. I didn't see any reasons to like the main character: no endearing quirks, no insightful actions. And her love for Howl (and vice versa) seemed to be assumed or even come out of nowhere (I was a bit surprised at this at the end of the film). The "true love" bit with the scarecrow was even more out of left field! Still, I didn't feel like I'd wasted my time and was happy to have seen it on the big screen. I really wish I'd been able to see "Spirited Away" on the big screen!
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Date: 2005-08-07 08:54 am (UTC)I found myself struck by the attitude of Salon's review (subscription or daypass required): "In some ways, Miyazaki should be my ideal filmmaker: I believe that dream logic is a perfectly valid form of plot construction, I love offbeat visual details and curlicues, and I appreciate the meticulousness with which Miyazaki maps out each frame, paying careful attention to composition and perspective. But [...] I must come clean: Miyazaki bores me to tears."
Maybe it's a cultural wall I'm running into or something, but that pretty much sums it up: I've appreciated Miyazaki's last few films, but I just didn't enjoy them. Oddly enough, I loved some of his earlier films, particularly Kiki and Totoro ... go figure.