Beautifully rich with imagination

Rating: 9/10 (14 November 2005)

I was never a big fan of anime cartoons, to me they seemed very two-sided. On one side you have incredibly fluent and perfectly drawn mind-boggling details, which are mainly used in action scenes, and on the other side you have those crude repetitive monotonous moments of people walking, opening their mouths or just chunks of hair dangling in the wind's breeze where it almost feels as if the animation department is rushing and simplifying their job. "Hauru No Ugoku Shiro" starts exactly like the latter and I jumped to a conclusion way too soon. Because what I was about to see was nothing less than magic. I forgot the last time a movie captivated me so strongly, the last time I truly felt that kid I once used to be-this movie delivered big -time. Such creativity and pure fantasy extravaganza is almost unheard of today, yet Hayao Miyazaki lets us indulge in it with such ease and simplistic honesty it feels as if he's the only person in the world with imagination worth mentioning. And his definitely is! A colorful palette of characters and a beautiful story are the key element why this movie is worth seeing.
Recommendations: anyone who misses feeling like the child they were, people who miss creative movies.
9/10