Entertaining but not as much as other Studio Ghibli's works

Rating: 4/10 (12 September 2014)

The movie opens slowly with intriguing first scene. It brings the viewers to another fantasy world definitive of Studio Ghibli. But this time the world setting gets to feel more victorian, steampunk and technological besides being magical. The story floats in and out of contrasting conflicts, another signature of Japanese anime aimed at various age groups. Yet I don't like how the movie keeps changing Sophie's age back and forth without any clear explanation. The story also ends quite abruptly with the background conflict of the war just ceasing out unclear. The voice acting on the Japanese version is a standard Japanese work with less dramatic voice acting yet with more quirky voice timbres.