Il ragazzo e l'airone

A disjointed mess of a movie, with many confusing elements, and a non-cohesive storyline.

I went into it expecting a thoughtful farewell and bittersweet celebration of Miyazaki's legacy, and instead came out of the theater taken aback and disappointed. A work like this I would expect from Goro, not his father.

I cannot fathom how so many reviewers have given this movie nines or tens. By no means is it deserving of such high praise, and I have to believe this dissonance is due to fanboy-ism and an inability to criticize the work of someone they love.

Well, I love Miyazaki's work as well, but I also understand that it's important to be objective and not biased in an increasingly all too biased world.

I hope he creates another, and redeems himself, as I do not want this to be the note he ends his praise-worthy legacy on. Regardless, thanks for all the fantastic memories and moments you've already provided me, Mr. Miyazaki.

If you have never watched a Hayao Miyazaki film, I wouldn't recommend starting with The Boy and the Heron.

For an introduction I'd recommend to start with Spirited Away (2001) and Princess Mononoke (1997).

If you become amused and the films resonate with you. Then you will enjoy The Boy and Heron. It isn't the strongest of Hayao Miyazaki and Ghibli films but a very good addition to their filmography.

The film begins with a slow pace of mostly visually defining the world, characters and their dilemmas. As the movie progresses you see touches of another realm. Before you know it, it becomes a full-blown feverish dream of Hayao Miyazaki imagination and story telling. It eventually comes all together back on its feet at the end.

Was it fun and visually pleasing? Yes.

Was I confused at times And had a lot of unanswered question? Also yes.

Not his best, but a very solid fairy tale from the master with lots of his trademark elements like stoic characters, spirit worlds, flying scenes and characters running through narrow passages.

It is stylistically comparable to Spirited Away and Howls Moving Castle, although a bit less epic in scope. Like those films it inhibits a certain darkness and maturity at times with a war as a backdrop, that is not really aimed at children. I personally liked it and wished that more filmmakers in animation would have similar aspirations, but I guess those who do are expelled to do short movies. But back to Miyazaki's movie: it is bursting with lots of ideas, symbolism and fairy tale motifs like Snow White (with a dead mother, seven dwarfettes and a glass coffin with a sleeping beauty). At other times the character dynamics invoke Jim Henson's Labyrinth, where the protagonist has to rescue a kidnapped loved one and work with a henchman who sells him out at every opportunity until they start bonding.

All the visual ideas are great but sometimes they can unnecessary bloat the picture. It is one of Miyazaki weaknesses to be over-indulgent and unfocused at times, sometimes he needs to tighten the story in certain places - especially during the last stretch it can feel exhausting. I still like the leisurely pace in the beginning and that the movie takes it's time to slowly pull us into another world/afterlife/beforelife however you want to call this place. There are beautiful visual metaphors like when the little balloon creatures fly off into the next world, one can say that those symbolize the protagonists own emotions bubbling up into the surface (this is also the first sequence where we see the main character smile and express genuine emitions) - and that he tries to repress those feelings. Especially towards his new stepmom which he tries to rescue seemingly out of pure obligation for his father. It is also no coincidence that we witness the appearance of an avatar of his real mother in that very same sequence - she tries to protect those cute balloons from hungry predators, but in the process burns most of them. The clinging to the ghost from the past is preventing a new blossoming/beginning. There simply aren't easy and clean-cut solutions, neither in nature nor our society.

There are certain moments where someone can get the impression that Miyazaki is making a statement towards his own legacy and the studio he helped to build. There are themes of responsibility & duty versus family sharing a lot of similarities to his last movie 'The Wind Rises' . I appreciated the ending, without getting into any spoiler territory, a lot of people wondered or were baffled why the final scene feels sort of "tacked on". But when you closely observe it, it is sound with the movie's themes and illustrates rather well the important choice of our main character.

From Studio Ghibli, The Boy and the Heron is an animated movie about a boy that dramatically lose his mother due the war in Japan, and he and his father have to move to a safer place. When they arrive, they live in a nice and quiet home. In a place, were strange things did happen, and will happen, too. First of all, I have to list up what was good about the film. It was absolutely beautiful animation with great paint, drawing techniques, and amazing colors. They had that mix with painting-like animation, but at the same time, classic Japanese anime. And I really liked that, I think it is a very nice thing, and I can see that this is a technique that Studio Ghibli is using a lot, and they are really doing it well. Very nice music. It was soft, easy and quiet, but at the same time it built up a hidden suspense that was holding. The music was some sort of anxiety mixed with calmness. Very strange. Last thing that was good was the overall atmosphere and the feeling of the movie, at least in the first act. Because then things started to get a little weird. Everything became unknown and messy, the story changed the course multiple times, and I wasn't sure which way the plot was going to go. At the end everything became a little more clear, but still a little weird. When you don't know what is really going on, the action becomes a little nonsense, too. And that was exactly what happened. The action sequences were sometimes fun and entertaining, but I was still questioning: Why are they doing it? Why are they running? What are they running from? What's the point of the story? Good enough that they had a good moral at the end. Very great with a good message about the balance of the world, and that the soul value is very important. After all, this was a movie on the middle. Great music and animation. Fine atmosphere in the first act. But it got a little messy, and the story changed course to many times. They rushed a lot and I didn't get time to think. Studio Ghibli could have definitely done better.

The imagery that completely stuck with me is when things overwhelm Mahito. From the frogs, to the pelicans, the warawara, the fish guts, and the parakeets. And Mahito's reaction is not even fight or flight. He stays still as if frozen and completely unable to react.

And that's maybe why it was important for Mahito to know that forgetting is normal. His feeling of loss and grief and the feeling of having to adjust to changes in his environment may be overwhelming and maybe a solution is trying to forget.

The granduncle is Miyazaki himself. He tries to find someone who can continue his legacy but in the end completely accepts that the worlds that he built and the stories he has told may crumble and completely be forgotten. And that is one truth that an artist will find hard to take.