Howls Movie Castle

Rating: 4/10 (24 September 2013)

Hayao Miyazaki's film, Howl's Moving Castle based off Diana Wayne Jones children's book, explores a beautifully animated fantasy world. The hand drawn scenes include everything from "The Royal City," to a never ending flower filled valley, and, of course Howl's Moving Castle. Everything seems to be more exciting or thrilling and the viewer has to keep reminding themselves to pay attention to what is really going on. No one seems to care about the shallow characters or their lack of logical thoughts because the audience is too intrigued by the breath- taking images Miyazaki creates. Sophie, voiced by Emily Mortimer and Jean Simmons, is a young girl who is stuck working in a hat shop during what appears to be an industrial revolution. One day, while on her way to meet her sister, she encounters a problematic situation, but is luckily saved by a wizard named Howl, voiced by Christian Bale, but little does she know, she is actually being brought into an even larger problem. Sophie manages to instantly fall in love with Howl right as he leaves to take on a larger task at hand. Her love for him draws The Witch of the Waste, voiced by Lauren Bacall, to curse Sophie changing her into an old woman, who Howl will not be attracted to. Sophie, distraught that she is an old woman decides to walk up a mountain, because as a fail old woman, that is a great idea. She then seems to encounter all the magic and wizardry that exists even though she has no magical powers herself, first with encountering Howl's Moving Castle, just by accident. Though not much of a castle and there never is an explanation of why it is called a castle, quests occur for not only Howl, but Sophie and the gang of the cursed individuals who just seem to keep appearing. The film contains a mixture of cheesy lines and witty ones, whose only point is to entertain the audience because the characters are not remarkable. At one point, Howl, who is regularly throwing a temper tantrum, states, "I see no point in living if I can't be beautiful", and Calcifer, a talking fire, voiced by Billy Crystal, states, "I can't stand the fire and gunpowder". Laddie, Sophie's sister who is seen for part of a scene, has no significant value to the structure of the film, but is still put in. No matter what is going on in the film, Sophie's curse of an old woman seems to be the most important issue in the world, I mean it's not like larger issues are going on like a worldwide war. The characters' individuality stops functioning during the film and just seems to go wherever the director puts them, whether it makes sense or not. There are also countless moments where the question "Why?" comes to mind. The film is also very vague in describing why a specific scene is occurring, leading to a great deal confusion. There is no doubt that Miyazaki created a beautiful backdrop and characters, but the storyline was no match for the "scenery porn". The fact that everything was hand drawn with minimal computer enhancement made you wonder how Miyazaki did it. Drawn to how Miyazaki could continuously to top the images as the film progresses, the storyline just seemed to fade into the background. The only way to improve the film is to remove the characters, even with their witty comments, lack a connection with the audience. In this film, the characters are certainly upstaged by the backdrop. The film definitely has flair with all the beautiful scenes, but lacks something more from the plot. Film directors are pushing their limits with the backgrounds, forgetting to focus on a stimulating storyline.