Look for what's underneath!

Rating: 7/10 (26 July 2019)

This is the only Miyazaki film I've seen so far that's what's on its surface is way, way less impressive than what's underneath it. Neither its fantastical story, its visual splendor, nor its understated yet funny humour hold a candle to its subtext. Howl's Moving Castle's weight lies on What's beyond its story. It's actually a meditation on age and love. Miyazaki allows you here to see the world through the eyes of an adult who longs to be young again while conveying a plethora of lessons by his visual storytelling, which is here at its finest regarding practicality, but this is not the case regarding creativity.
The film also has tons of pacing issues, most noticeably in the first hurried 15 minutes and the rushed denouement. It also never fully settles into its storytelling technique. I wouldn't have minded the self-indulgent dreamy-like narration (well, not so much), nor this of the your typical sweet fairly tale one. But the mix of both made everything feels quite messy instead of flowing like a hallucinatory dream or an intriguing fantastical adventure story.
Indeed, these issues had me confused a little bit. But the unprecedented practical visual storytelling I've mentioned above undeniably compensates for that. As the film proceeds, I find myself understand almost every obscure detail without being explained. That's mostly, if not entirely, due to Miyazaki's unmatched ability to tell a story relying on visual symbolism that remarkably keeps paying off till the last second.
Overall, Howl's Moving Castle is the least Hayao Miyazaki film I've enjoyed so far. But that should by no means indicate that it isn't an exceptional work that's as light-hearted and delightful as it's though-provoking and heartwarming.
(7.5/10)