Howl

[davidlevine]

Last night I saw Howl's Moving Castle. Today I have the song "I Should Be Allowed To Think" by They Might Be Giants going through my head. This tells you something about how my brain works. (Bonus points if you can trace the references.)

I recommend this movie. It was lush, exciting, and emotional, with warm and believable characters and gorgeous, gorgeous animation. I haven't read the source book, but we went with a friend (WINOLJ) who is a huge Diana Wynne Jones fan, and it sounds like Miyazaki changed it almost completely (for example, the book has none of the movie's steam-powered automobiles or flying machines, and the scarecrow in the movie is friendly and helpful instead of being terrifying as in the book).

But if you like Miyazaki you'll love this movie. It's even more visually sophisticated than Princess Mononoke, but there's much less ooze and violence, and the plot makes more sense. Mind you, the plot is still rather tenuous and indistinct, at times incomprehensible, but that's Miyazaki for you.

I'd like to see it again with subtitles. Most of the voices in this dub are fine (I particularly liked Billy Crystal as the fire demon, others disagreed) but I didn't care for the voice of Howl and I bet the original Japanese voice suited the character-as-drawn better.

Comments

[jenwrites.livejournal.com]

You know what I want to see? I want to see Harold and Kumar Go to Howl's Moving Castle.

Crystal

[lsanderson.livejournal.com]

Crystal seemed not nearly as bad as the NY Times and the Slate reviewer thought. All in all, an excellent movie. Wish Lucas had hired the writers.

Re: Lucas

[whumpdotcom.livejournal.com]

We were talking about Ep. III yesterday at work and decided that Murch, Coppola, and the rest of the NorCal Movie mafia need to stage an intervention: no more screenwriting until Lucas goes back to school.

Re: Crystal

[ecmyers.livejournal.com]

Hmm...there were at least two Lucas-worthy lines in the movie that I can recall, both spoken by Howl: "Now I have something to protect, AND IT'S YOU," as well as "Wow! Your hair is like starlight!" Not on the level of "I don't like the sand..." or "Hold me like you held me at Lake Naboo," but not great. Then again, Howl isn't very experienced at that kind of thing, he's really still just a kid, so maybe this was right on the money.

I'm going to assume those came off poorly because of the dub and translation. I'll have to see the subtitled version to compare.

[mkhobson.livejournal.com]

I liked Billy Crystal too. He seemed to fit in quite nicely as a standard Miyazaki sidekick, like the wisecracking cat in "Kiki's Delivery Service" or Muta in "The Cat Returns."

I actually rather liked the voice for Howl ... I am not a huge fan of generally feminized anime heros, and the lower voice helped mitigate that somewhat. But that's just me.

M

[ecmyers.livejournal.com]

I liked Billy Crystal, but I really loved Turnip head as one of the minor characters. I think Bale's voice was fine for Howl, but his voice acting didn't seem to suit the part very well. I hope he'll be much more convincing in Batman Begins.

[mkhobson.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I liked turnip head but I barked a loud, somewhat derisive laugh when his mystery was revealed at the end. I thought it was a really clumsy resolution. I really wanted his curse (and his attachment to Sophie) to make more sense and be more relevant to the plot as a whole.

Oh well. He *was* a great character. I really liked him. I want a turnip head to fall in love with me and follow me around. ;-)

M

[marykaykare.livejournal.com]

Well Jordin and I saw the subtitled version last night. I found it hugely distracting to have all these European looking people, with European names, wearing European clothes and running around European cities spouting Japanese. It was just weird.

We also felt that the whole last half of the movie made no sense whatsoever. From the point where Sophie takes Calcifer outside the castle so it falls apart and then brings him back in again so he can movie it. Uh?

MKK

[ecmyers.livejournal.com]

From the point where Sophie takes Calcifer outside the castle so it falls apart and then brings him back in again so he can movie it.

I believe she did that to reset the portals and disconnect the castle from the hat shop, which Howl was trying to protect. By removing the link to it, they were out of danger (albeit in a destroyed castle) and Howl could stop worrying about them. In theory.

[marykaykare.livejournal.com]

Okay, but how was I supposed to know that? So far as I could tell nobody mentioned it....

MKK

[ecmyers.livejournal.com]

I think it was mentioned in the dialogue, but not in a very obvious way. I was a little confused myself; Sophie's plan just wasn't very well explained. One moment she says something like "we need to change the portals," the next she is taking Calcifer out which seems like a really bad idea, then she says that now they have to go get Howl and tell him to stop defending the shop because they aren't there anymore. There is no clear line from A to B to C, but this is what I got from it. I'm sure Miyazaki knows exactly what was up though :)

That's what I thought...

[lsanderson.livejournal.com]

As well. I think is supported by the dubbed version. It's also resolving the issue of howl's heart and the captivity of the demon. And, it is a magic castle, so magicking it back together should be a snap.

[sdn.livejournal.com]

i refuse to see this movie in its dubbed version. i will search out the subtitled one.

p.s. also, billy crystal? EW