Howl's Moving Castle (film)
From AwardAnnals
| Film: | Howl's Moving Castle |
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| Director: | Hayao Miyazaki |
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| Distributor: | Walt Disney Video |
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Reviews
Amazon.com
Like a dream, Howl’s Moving Castle carries audiences to vistas beyond their imaginations where they experience excitement, adventure, terror, humor, and romance. With domestic box office receipts of over $210 million, Howl passed Miyazaki’s Princess Mononoke to become the #3 film in Japanese history, behind his Spirited Away and James Cameron’s Titanic. Based on a juvenile novel by Diana Wynne Jones, Howl’s Moving Castle marks the first time Miyazaki has adapted another writer’s work since Kiki’s Delivery Service (1989). Sophie, a 19-year-old girl who believes she is plain, has resigned herself to a drab life in her family’s hat shop—until the Witch of the Waste transforms her into a 90-year-old woman. In her aged guise, Sophie searches for a way to break the Witch’s spell and finds unexpected adventures. Like Chihiro, the heroine of Spirited Away, Sophie discovers her hidden potential in a magical environment—the castle of the title. Using CG, Miyazaki creates a ramshackle structure that looks like it might disintegrate at any moment. Sophie’s honesty and determination win her some valuable new friends: Markl, Howl’s young apprentice; a jaunty scarecrow; Calcifer, a temperamental fire demon; and Heen, a hilarious, wheezing dog. She wins the heart of the dashing, irresponsible wizard Howl, and brings an end an unnecessary and destructive war. The film overflows with eclipsing visuals that range from frightening aerial battles to serene landscapes, and few recent features—animated or live action—offer as much magic as Howl’s Moving Castle. —Charles Solomon
Barnes and Noble
Hayao Miyazaki, the Orson Welles of anime, demonstrates his mastery of this storytelling form yet again with a vivid, exciting yarn that blends adventure, romance, fantasy, and science fiction. It gets underway when 18-year-old Sophie Hatter, cursed by the Witch of the Waste, is transformed into an old hag. Ashamed of her appearance, Sophie flees into the nearby countryside, where a moving castle owned by a handsome young wizard drifts across the hills. She befriends the fire demon Calcifer, who promises to lift the curse if she helps liberate him from the influence of Howl, the wizard. Dreamlike almost to the point of surrealism, Howl’s Moving Castle doesn’t have a particularly intricate plot, nor does it offer much by way of character development. But it’s beautifully designed and deceptively simple in terms of emotional resonance. Miyazaki manipulates the elements of anime better than just about anyone else; he presents supernatural surroundings and phenomena with unusual sensitivity, and in this film he creates a fairy-tale environment that enhances the story and moves the viewer in subtle ways. Ed Hulse
Related works
After fifty years of quiet, it was rumored that the Witch was about to terrorize the country again. So when a moving black castle, blowing dark smoke from its four thin turrets, appeared on the horizon, everyone thought it was the Witch. The castle, however, belonged to Wizard Howl, who, it was said, liked to suck the souls of young girls.
The Hatter sisters—Sophie, Lettie, and Martha—and all the other girls were warned not to venture into the streets alone. But that was only the beginning.
In this giant jigsaw puzzle of a fantasy, people and things are never quite what they seem. Destinies are intertwined, identities exchanged, lovers confused. The Witch has placed a spell on Howl. Does the clue to breaking it lie in a famous poem? And what will happen to Sophie Hatter when she enters Howl’s castle?
Diana Wynne Jones’s entrancing fantasy is filled with surprises at every turn, but when the final stormy duel between the Witch and the Wizard is finished, all the pieces fall magically into place.
