Miyazaki/Kitano/Oshii at Venice
Mark Nornes
amnornes at umich.edu
Wed Jul 30 12:08:35 EDT 2008
Venice just announced their line-up for the next festival, and three
Japanese films are in competition: Takeshi Kitano's "Achilles and the
Tortoise," Hayao Miyazaki's "Ponyo in the Cliff by the Sea," and
Mamoru Oshii's "The Sky Crawlers." The new triumvirate to replace
Mizoguchi/Ozu/Kurosawa!
I'm just back from Japan, a busy trip where I managed to see only one
film—Ponyo. The theater was packed and filled with energy, a nice
change from the empty theaters I usually see in Japan. This film felt
like a return to roots for Miyazaki. I won't go into the (green, and
somewhat incoherent) narrative here, excepty to say that this is more
Totoro than Mononoke. Kids will love it, and the audience in Tokyo
cheered and clapped when it was over. But a word on the style. What CG
he's used is pretty well hidden and seamless, while most cel-animation
films these days are aesthetically schizophrenic. I appreciated that.
The opening scene must have sucked up half the budget; set deep in the
ocean, there are thousands of hand-drawn bubbles and stunning splashes
of color. It subsequently settles into a less flashy style. The
figures are fairly simple, often set in occasionally awkward movement
through limited animation. Backgrounds are pretty pastel drawing that
evoke picture books for young Japanese children. However, half-way
through the film, a storm whips the animation into pure spectacle, the
proportions of which few artists besides Miyazaki could achieve. It's
a truly stunning sequence, and probably pretty scary for small
children. The bright pastel palette of the backgrounds, turns dark;
where they were frozen backdrops before, the ocean and trees begin to
move and whip into a frenzy. It's masterful stuff. Finally, I'd note
that the darkness of the storm is filled with subtle detail that will
be lost on a television screen. Many scenes feature tiny animated
objects that will probably fuzz into cloud, even on an HD monitor. I
often found myself admiring an animator that is conceptualizing his
film, start to finish, for the big screen. Be sure to see it in a
theater.
Now has anyone seen the other two films?
Markus
A. M. Nornes
Professor
Department of Screen Arts & Cultures
Department of Asian Languages & Cultures
University of Michigan
Department of Asian Languages and Cultures
Suite 6111, 202 South Thayer Street
Ann Arbor, MI 48104-1608
Phone: (734) 647-2094; FAX: x0157
Homepage: www.umich.edu/~amnornes
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://mailman.yale.edu/pipermail/kinejapan/attachments/20080730/21bd5bcf/attachment.html
More information about the KineJapan
mailing list