![]() No animals feel danger in approaching her she’s able to totally erase her sense of presence, existence. It isn’t the swordplay that Nausicäa is good at, it’s that she understands both the human world and the insect world. In the oldest form of the Cinderella story, she was able to travel freely to the other world through the hearth: that’s what empowered her. “Why did the lead character have to be female? Well, it doesn’t look truthful if the guy has power like that! Women are able to straddle both the real world and the other world - like mediums. And then later I had to make it into a film, so I was in deep trouble! There were a lot of things I just didn’t know how to do back then, how to make it work. Miyazaki on Miyazaki “The original manga was written when I had no job in animation - I had a lot of time to myself, so I tried to make a comic that couldn’t be made into animation. While this enthusiastic, irreverent romp doesn’t feel like ‘pure’ Miyazaki, it does revel in its Riviera setting, displaying a love for European architecture and landscape that’s since defined much of his work (Laputa: Castle In The Sky, Porco Rosso, Howl’s Moving Castle). Not a sequel, rather a feature spin-off of TV show Lupin The 3rd (itself derived from Monkey Punch’s comic book, or manga), on which Miyazaki worked, the film follows the continuing misadventures of the titular rogue - grandson of Maurice Leblanc’s Arsène - as he embroils himself in the affairs of the nefarious Duke Of Cagliostro. ![]() Miyazaki’s cinematic debut stands apart from the bulk of his work, given it’s his only movie as, effectively, a director-for-hire. ![]() We’ve arrived at Miyazaki’s private office building, a few streets down from the studio proper, where we find the man himself in his central office, a large but welcoming space whose two salient features are a grand piano and a wood-burning stove, which Miyazaki keeps topping up with timber during our near-two-hour discussion of his work. Studio Ghibli consists of three unassuming buildings located in the quiet suburb of Koganei in western Tokyo. And when Empire meets the 68 year-old director for a rare interview, we suspect he may just qualify as an eccentric one. His own producer, Toshio Suzuki, also a Ghibli board-member, simply describes him as “a genius”. Miyazaki is a high fantasist as comfortable dreaming up steampunk action-adventures as he is intimate child dramas, inter-war aerial romps, post-apocalyptic wastescapes, monster-populated spirit worlds, or the deep, violent past of his own homeland, Japan. ![]() Pixar chief John Lasseter claims he’s “one of the greatest filmmakers of our time”, and the fact that Lasseter now oversees all Miyazaki’s English dubs, attracting such talent as Billy Bob Thornton, Christian Bale, Lauren Bacall and Liam Neeson to voice them, should suggest he’s not exaggerating. The respect that animators the world over have for Hayao Miyazaki is hard to overstate. Prepare for 30 years of unparalleled magic. With Studio Ghibli's eleventh feature, Arrietty, about to hit our screens, Empire is proud to relive the studio's filmography with the man who continues to preside over it so gloriously. Hayao Miyazaki is arguably the greatest living animation director, the Japanese Walt Disney - though he’d not thank you for the title.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |