Isao Takahata

[Aaron Gerow]

I always use the film when I teach animation, showing in the least some 
clips, but when I show the entire film to a non-Japanese speaking class 
I give the students a pretty detailed plot summary that I have 
prepared. For those who are interested, I attach it below.

Prince of the Sun: The Great Adventure of Hols
Director: Takahata Isao
Year: 1968
Length: 82 minutes

English Synopsis by Aaron Gerow

	The boy Hols lives in the wild north with his father.  One day he is 
fighting the silver wolves of Grunwald when the Rock Man Moog awakes 
from his nap.  Not fearing him, Hols removes a sword stuck in Moog's 
shoulder and gets to keep it―the Sword of Princes―for himself.  Moog 
tells him that if Hols can master the huge sword, the rock man will 
become his servant and Hols will truly become the Prince of the Sun.
	When Hols returns to his home, the bear Koro tells him that his father 
is dying.  Before expiring, his father tells him of a devil who 
destroyed his former village by using the evil inside people.  The 
father says that to save the baby Hols, he had to leave the village to 
go to this remote region, but now realizes that that was a mistake.  He 
orders Hols to return to the populated land and bring people back 
together: "If people get together, they can defeat anything."
	After cremating his father, Hols and Koro head by boat towards the 
area where people live.  But many dangers await them.  The first time 
they land, they are attacked by giant birds, one of which takes Hols 
away to a distant mountain peak.  Hols uses his trusty axe to save 
himself from falling down a cliff, but when he reaches the top, he 
encounters Grunwald.  Hearing of Hols's feats, Grunwald offers to make 
him his brother, but Hols, knowing of the many people Grunwald has 
killed, refuses.  Hols vows to defeat this being who declares that the 
world belongs to him, but Grunwald throws him down the cliff into a 
river.
	Luckily, the village boy Flepp finds Hols floating in the water and 
takes him back home.  When he gets better, he hears that Flepp's father 
has just died trying to get rid of a monster barracuda that has eaten 
up all their fish.  Hearing the villagers' laments, Hols decides to go 
off on his own to kill the barracuda, which he succeeds in doing after 
a great battle.  The villagers are thrilled that fish have finally 
returned to the river.  Hearing the commotion, Koro approaches the 
village and is finally reunited with Hols.  Some villagers, however, 
are suspicious of Hols and his feat.
	It seems that the barracuda was a servant of Grunwald.  Angered, 
Grunwald sends his pack of wolves to attack the village, but the 
villagers, forming a united opposition, repulse their assault.  Hols 
chases after the lead silver wolf, but loses him in the fog.  He then 
happens upon a deserted village where he can hear a girl singing.  
Investigating, he finds Hilda, a sad but beautiful girl who tells him 
that no village will let her live with them.  Her own village was 
destroyed by Grunwald, but she survived by making a pact with him.  
Seeing his own loneliness in her, Hols invites her to the village.  
There her songs captivate everyone, so much so that they give up 
working. This seems to be part of her plan, for Hilda is in fact 
Grunwald's "sister."
	The villagers invite her to a wedding ceremony, but Hilda, deeply 
troubled, wanders off alone.  She steals the axe belonging to Hols, who 
is still hunting down the silver wolf, and then sends a wave of rats to 
attack the village.  When Hols returns, Hilda casts doubt on him for 
being the only one absent from the village when the rats attacked, a 
charge that is echoed by the evil villager Drago.  Nevertheless Hilda, 
earning the unquestioned love of the little girl Mauni, suffers a 
conflict of heart, one that is voiced in the quarrel between the 
squirrel Chiro and the owl Toto.  While Chiro expresses Hilda's desire 
to return to being a normal girl, Toto reminds her of the eternal life 
Grunwald has given her.  Almost out of self-hate, Hilda proclaims that 
she is indeed the sister of the devil.  Still, she remains deeply 
saddened by her position and laments the mortality of humanity.
	Hols tries to comfort her but fails.  He returns to the village and, 
when his missing axe is brought forward, is accused of trying to kill 
the chieftain.  Hols tells everyone he was with Hilda, but she refuses 
to back his alibi.  The owl Toto causes an illusion which makes it seem 
like Hols is trying to kill Hilda.  Hols leaves the village, vowing to 
show all of them who the devil really is.  He runs off but encounters 
Hilda, who asks him why he hasn't fought her.  "The girl who saved you 
is really your enemy.  You are just a poor human like Drago and the 
others."  Toto tells Hols that Hilda is Grunwald's sister, bent on 
destroying the human race, but Hols pleads with Hilda to tell him that 
is not true.  But she just takes out a knife, promising to show him her 
true self.  Yet Hols still believes that there is another side to Hilda 
that wants to be human.  She hesitates, but upon Toto's urging, pushes 
Hols into the Forest of the Lost.  Chiro, disgusted by that act, leaves 
Hilda to return to the village.
	In the Forest of the Lost, Hols encounters his own doubts about Hilda 
and himself.  In the meantime, Hilda, shocked by Chiro's words, tells 
Grunwald that people will eventually believe in Hols again.  She 
declares that she will go off and live alone in the icy north, but 
Grunwald asserts that unless he fights back, Hilda will be killed at 
the hands of Hols and the villagers.
	Grunwald then attacks the village using ice wolves that freeze 
everything.  Potem and the others decide to fight back using a huge 
fire.  Hols also escapes from the Forest of the Lost by realizing that 
the solution lies in uniting the people through the sword of the Prince 
of the Sun.  He encounters Hilda on the way back, and she tries to stab 
him, but he remains unwavering in his decision to take her back to the 
village.  She, however, refuses to go, but urges him to return to help 
the village.
	A huge ice mammoth is assaulting the village when the villagers set 
their fires.  The fire proves that the devil can be defeated.  Hols 
returns to tell them that it is the sword that can ultimately defeat 
Grunwald.  Meanwhile, Koro struggles back to the village with Flepp on 
his back but is caught in the storm.  Hilda finds them and gives them 
her "jewel of immortal life," but is then attacked by the ice wolves.
	The villagers reforge the sword, which Hols then wields to attack the 
mammoth and Grunwald.  Just then, Moog appears to declare his support 
for Hols and to destroy the mammoth.  Koro and Flepp arrive to give 
Hols the jewel, which allows him to fly.  With the jewel and the sword, 
Hols and the villagers chase Grunwald back to his lair.  With the sun 
behind him, Hols throws the sword and vanquishes Grunwald.
	Hols notices a crying Chiro, who says that Hilda has died.  But Hilda 
awakes in a meadow alive amongst the flowers of spring.  She returns to 
the village much to the joy of Chiro and Mauni.  Hols takes her hand 
and the two run off with the rest to the hills.

Aaron Gerow
Film Studies and East Asian Languages and Literatures
Yale University