Forum - View topicNEWS: Ghibli's Arrietty Filling Seats at 87% of Ponyo's Rate
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Zac
ANN Executive Editor
 Posts: 7912 Location: Anime News Network Technodrome |
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This worries me more than anything. |
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koinosuke
 Posts: 271 Location: Fukushima, Japan |
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You're spot on about the story coherence, which is why it's easily the worst Ghibli production, but the film does still have some strong points that certainly make it better than the average anime movie. There's the aforementioned animation, with it's beautiful color palate and wonderful background imagery, and the film has enough of a unique feeling and style to it that it can be enjoyable on these things alone. Not to mention that the soundtrack is amazing, something sadly overlooked since half the people who see Earthsea dislike the movie so much. I do recommend Ghibli fans who disliked Earthsea to try watching the movie again at some point; once you know that the story is going to be crap you can better appreciate all the other aspects. This doesn't save the movie or make it great by any extent, but I really enjoy watching it myself, and I thought it sucked the first time I saw it, too. |
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enurtsol
 Posts: 14773 |
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Name an average anime movie that it is better than. 
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ZenErik
 Posts: 392 Location: Boston |
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As someone who has seen every Pokemon movie, I would say that Tales from Earthsea is better than at least 1 or 2 of them. 
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koinosuke
Posts: 271 Location: Fukushima, Japan |
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Alright. In the same summer Tales from Earthsea was released in, I also saw the film Brave Story in theaters. It was a very well animated movie with well enough charm, a big budget, and advertising behind it. In other words, one of the biggest anime of 2006. It was ok, but Earthsea was much better (and remember, I thought Earthsea was a really big disappointment). In another example from the same time period, though not anime, I saw the first live-action Death Note movie in theaters a month or so before Earthsea. This was another big-budget Japanese movie that was seen by many people. Death Note was enjoyable enough, and as a fan of the manga it was fun to see put to screen, but once again Earthsea was much better. The thing is, maybe it was more fun to see a relatively mindless movie like Brave Story at the time, but despite all its faults there is an innate feeling and quality about Earthsea that makes it much more lasting. It isn't a great movie, but it still has that quality. You can tell how much time and effort went into it, even when it ultimately failed as a movie. |
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enurtsol
Posts: 14773 |
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Then we'll use those "average anime movies" mentioned as comparison then, when it comes out. Let's see what people say.
(Let's already discount what Pokemon and Death Note fans will say.) |
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vanfanel
 Posts: 1242 |
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Fear not. I saw it a couple of days ago, and can at least say that the storyline has its i's dotted and t's crossed. Only in one scene did it seem to go out of its way to pound a Miyazaki hobbyhorse, but that was only for one or two lines' worth of dialog. The movie's ending makes sense. I haven't read the book, so I don't know how close it is or isn't. A few years ago, I read "Howl's Moving Castle" shortly before the movie came out. That was not a mistake I was going to make again. |
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Keonyn
 Subscriber Posts: 5567 Location: Coon Rapids, MN |
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Ah, well that's even less comparable then. The direct to DVD sequels Disney made were never really up to par and were done by a completely different studio from their feature films. That direct to DVD studio that made those films is now defunct as well so even Disney realized they were really only harming their own titles that way. I personally never watch them and completely ignore their existence.
I don't know if I'd count that as a mistake to actually read the original because you might not enjoy an adaptation that isn't true to it as a result. Last edited by Keonyn on Mon Jul 19, 2010 2:30 am; edited 1 time in total |
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Ahab
Posts: 28 |
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Holy cow! What a movie!
I have just walked out of the cinema after having seeing this movie and I couldn't be more pleased with how this movie turned out. The whole direction and production was seamless. This is definitely not a movie directed by Miyazaki and it shows. The colorful animation is breathtaking and the lushness of the garden and Arrietty's world is simply stunning. I love all the little trinkets and attention to detail that has been put into this movie. little things like Arrietty's father using double-sided sticky tape to scale a table and also the not so obvious touches like the picture of the sea that is propped up by a window to give the borrowers a little space to chill out and drink their tea "by the seaside". The music also fits the movie perfectly neither being too intrusive or over the top. Its melodic and comes in at all the right places. This movie is waaaay better than Ponyo and I really hope that Yonebayashi goes on to do more directing at Studio Ghibli. Welcome back Studio Ghibli! It's great to see you back to doing what you do best!
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vanfanel
Posts: 1242 |
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Well, I didn't mean it was a mistake to read the book; it was just a mistake to read it before seeing Miyazaki's version, which was fairly faithful until about midway through, then shot off at a nonsensical ninety-degree angle. I might read "The Borrowers" now, but after the "Howl" experience, I didn't want to fill my head with a bunch of expectations before going to a movie I absolutely wasn't going to miss anyway. |
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vanfanel
Posts: 1242 |
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Y'know, the fact that the vocal bits were in English took me out of it a couple of times, though. When English singing is layered with Japanese dialog, my ear hears its native language first. A little disorienting. From that perspective, it may play better dubbed. |
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Keonyn
Subscriber Posts: 5567 Location: Coon Rapids, MN |
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Ah, I can see that then. That was part of my problem with "Howl's Moving Castle" and why I don't actually care for it much. As it progresses it just starts to go all over the place and the story loses most of its cohesion. Things become completely idiotic as the film begins to reach its conclusion and the ending just feels like they tossed a few base ideas in to hat and then pull several out and jumbled it together based on that.
Of course, aside from just the stories second half were also a number of major problems with the narrative structure. The pacing of the film was about as random and all over the place as the story became in the second half, quick at times and painfully slow at others. The stairway scene is one of the more notable examples of that. I think Miyazaki learned with "Spirited Away" that he could slow the pacing with a positive impact. Unfortunately "Spirited Away" benefited from smooth and consistent pacing, while "Howl's Moving Castle" shuffled too much and was often tweaked too slow to work. That's part of what worried me about this film when I first read that he wrote the screenplay. Considering it was the screenplay that made "Howl's Moving Castle" not work nearly as well as it could have in my eyes, it honestly concerned me a bit that he is the writer for this movie. Still, the director has creative control, so even a script with pacing issues could be corrected by a competent director. I'm glad to hear that the response has been overwhelmingly positive so far, although I'm going to wait for some feedback from less anime oriented crowds before I completely disregard my skepticism. |
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Ahab
Posts: 28 |
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Did you really notice that? Wow! I'm pretty sure though that there is only one line of English in all the songs and that is the opening line to the song "Arrietty's song" which only plays in it's entirety once and that's at the end. (The opening line being; "I'm 14 years old. I'm pretty") apart from the occasional english word like "happy" and "blue" I honestly didn't notice as I found the music to be very soothing and appropriate for each scene. btw, did you pick up a copy of the Movie Programme? It's got some great pictures in it and some interesting interviews too! 
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vanfanel
Posts: 1242 |
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Japan Times has a review up: http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/ff20100716a2.html I agree with his comments about Haru and Sho, by the way; sometimes the movie felt rather conventional by Ghibli standards (which is still a step up from "incomprehensible mess of a plot"), and these two characters were the reasons. I did like the ending, though. Last edited by vanfanel on Mon Jul 19, 2010 4:23 am; edited 2 times in total |
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vanfanel
Posts: 1242 |
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A couple of times, they played parts of it during the movie, and it stood out like a sore thumb to me. Oh well...
Alas, I did not. Didn't even think about it at the time. Sounds nice, though. |
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