Movie Review: Howl’s Moving Castle
Apr 24th, 2008 by admin
- Director: Hayao Miyasaki
- Genre: Animation/Adventure/Mystery/Fantasy/Sci-Fi
- Year: 2004
For the longest time I had been on anime hiatus, mostly because anime largely is so disappointing half of the time. You get your occasional gems, Cowboy Bebop, Lain, Grave of the Firefly…but for the most part, even those that had potential, like Trigun and up being a bit of a wash. Miyasaki, however, has consistently come out with a good product. Princess Mononoke and Spirited Away are some of my favorite anime movies and this one largely fell into that same category.
One of the most enticing things about this movie is the imaginative approach and the unending amount of creativity that come bundled in it. The story revolves around a cursed girl and a cursed wizard, who end up tangled up in the same web and helping each other trying to return themselves back to normalcy. In the process, we are introduced to a number of colorful characters, including a fire demon that runs Howl’s castle.
As always the animation is above par and the story is never quite black and white. That is one thing that I find myself truly liking about Miyasaki movies, the fact that they do not have a clear antagonist, but rather characters that realistically have their own agendas and are not necessarily evil. However, the problems still are in the dub. I appreciate the fact that they got big names to do the english voices, including Christian Bale as Howl and Billy Crystal as Calcifer…but it still is not quite right, certain parts fall short. Its a good movie, though falling short of both Princess Mononoke and Spirited Away. Still, definately worth a watch.
Rating: 4 out of 5
Notes: This is a pretty kid safe movie, though some of the plot content is a bit on the more advanced level, the younger kids may find it slightly too complicated to follow. And unfortunately for them (fortunately for the rest of us) there is no real annoying, cutesy characters to keep them mindlessly occupied with.
Quote: Old Sophie: All right Calcifer, lets get cooking.
Calcifer: I don’t cook! I’m a scary fire demon!