The less magical Ghibli feature

Rating: 6/10 (3 May 2015)

Watching this movie as a part of my project to see all the IMDb top 250 movies. Laputa: Castle in the Sky is another widely loved fantasy themed animation feature by the visionary anime creator Hayao Miyazaki. However, compared to the other films of Miyazaki that I have seen (and which are on the IMDb top 250 list) this feels most like a genuine children tale. It's not as subtle and magical as the more successful Spirited Away or My Neighbor Totoro. The characters can be easily classified as "good" or "evil" and the film is stuffed with straightforward action. However, this is not necessary a bad thing - at least for a genuine children movie. Animation and drawing are - as can be expected - as good as usual. Interestingly all Miyazaki's Studio Ghibli animations (that I have seen so far) have several common features: a young girl as the main protagonist, elder female character with authority, castles and air-crafts. Furthermore, some of the animated characters (for example small fox- like animals in the Laputa island) appear again in later or earlier Ghibli features. To summarize, Laputa: Castle in the Sky has its moments but feels generally more like your standard Saturday morning cartoon feature (on the Pokemon- Digimon-axis) than the other Miyazaki movies.