Miyazaki Talks to the Guardian 234
BrainGeyser writes to tell us The Guardian is running an interesting summary of an interview with Hayao Miyazaki, proclaimed 'God' of anime. In the interview Miyazaki discusses a wide range of issues from his distribution deal with Disney to the future of anime. From the article: 'There is a rumor that when Harvey Weinstein was charged with handling the US release of Princess Mononoke, Miyazaki sent him a samurai sword in the post. Attached to the blade was a stark message: "No cuts."' While it was actually Miyazaki's producer, Miyazaki did 'go to New York to meet this man, this Harvey Weinstein, and [..] was bombarded with this aggressive attack, all these demands for cuts. He [Miyazaki] smiles. "I defeated him."'
No cut (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Renting (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Renting (Score:2, Informative)
Spirited Away requires some understanding of bath houses and kami to fully enjoy. Totoro also happens in Japan, but the story is more universal.
Kiki is his most disneyesque work, good for introducing others.
Nausicaa, Laputa, I'm sure I'm forgetting some.
Re:Miyazaki makes Pixar look like (Score:4, Informative)
You should definitely read his description [nausicaa.net] in the words of Mamoru Oshii of the "Ghost In The Shell" fame:
My first impression was that he was a really light hearted person. But when the conversation got heated, he was really merciless, and I was told many harsh things. -laughs- So it ended with the impression like "what a SOB!"
Re:Miyazaki makes Pixar look like (Score:5, Informative)
It stems from a 1980's North American release of Nausicaa that had been licensed by some fly-by-night American company. Re-titled "Warriors of the Wind", it was severely cut (running less than 66% of the original's time), utterly incomprehensible, and a total disaster. Miyazaki and Studio Ghibli were so pissed off that they asked fans to forget the existence of the film and adopted a strict "no edits" clause for any future foreign licensing deals.
Re:No cuts? (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Weinstien. Cuts? (Score:1, Informative)
Re:Weinstien. Cuts? (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Renting (Score:3, Informative)
Kiki's excellent, too, but almost purely a coming of age movie. Early-teen stuff, no war, no epic, no magic... except for the magic of a beautiful, idealistic European town, the magic of nice people, the magic of life, the magic of music and excellent storytelling. Oh, and some broom flights, too.
Re:Renting (Score:5, Informative)
There are four volumes, so it develops the world and story to a much greater depth than in the movie. It's Tolkienesque in scope, as much an exercise in world-building as storytelling. Miyazaki creates maps, kingdoms, technology, religions, and ecology for the world.
At the same time, his character development is excellent. As always his villains are the most interesting ones, and he's got a ton of them. They're also much more developed than in the movie. Princess Kushana switches sides halfway through, there's an immortal king suffering from ennui who is just fantastic, and then there's the God Warrior. The God Warrior is a mindless killing machine in the movie; but in the comics it is sentient... which makes it much more creepy, and Nausicaa's relationship with it is weirdly touching, but mostly disturbing.
There are some parts that come off as overly sentimental in the third volume- probably my least favorite- but it picks up again, strong, in the fourth. The fourth volume is as dark as Miyazaki gets. The ending... not happy, not unhappy. Complex. Again, that makes it one of his stronger works.
I'm not a huge fan of Japanese entertainment, but this is hands-down my favorite comic.
Re:Renting (Score:1, Informative)
Re:I worry about Miyazaki... (Score:2, Informative)
He was interviewed about this once:
Question: Why do you always choose a girl as your theme?
Miyazaki: I don't logically plan it that way. When we compare a man in action and a girl in action, I feel girls are more gallant. If a boy is walking with a long stride, I don't think anything particular, but if a girl is walking gallantly, I feel "that's cool." Maybe that's because I'm a man, and women may think it's cool when they see a young man striding. At first, I thought "this is no longer the era of men. This is no longer the era of taigimeibun." But after ten years, I grew tired of saying that. I just say "cause I like women." That has more reality.
The original quote was here: http://www.nausicaa.net/miyazaki/interviews/heroin es.html#s2 [nausicaa.net]. There's also a few more interviews about the subject there as well.
Cheers,
Paul