At the end of Hayao Miyazaki’s visually stunning “Howl’s Moving Castle,” the titular Howl laments about a sudden pain in his chest. The main character, Sophie, replies briefly but delightfully, “The heart is a heavy burden.”
The poignancy of the line reflects Miyazaki’s ability to mesmerize audiences with stunning artistry and mesmerizing stories that transport us to another world while grounding them in real human emotions. These characters all experience extraordinary things. They confront selfish witches and incinerate falling stars; They see a cursed prince transformed back into a human through the power of love. Like much of Miyazaki’s filmography, “Howl” is based on the human element of caring for others. This is important to the message of the film and relates to Miyazaki’s tireless work. This is especially true of his late career, where visions of art, beauty, and death meld together in memories, dreams, and dream noises. “The Wind Rises,” “The Boy and the Heron,” and the latest documentary “Hayao Miyazaki and the Heron” suggest a director whose priorities have changed. Yet amidst the old and the new, that line from Sophie rings true. The heart is a heavy burden, and Miyazaki sometimes seems intent on imagining its immense burden.
The value of artistry and heritage permeates Miyazaki’s most recent works. “The Wind Rises,” “The Boy and the Heron,” and the documentary all demonstrate a significant change in the tone of the director’s work. His early films had a strong sense of humanity, serving as cautionary tales about what could happen if heroes don’t get to the root of the world’s rot. By comparison, his latest works no longer have the youthful idealism that was evident in his earlier films. In the hands of others – young hands whose idealism can mend the trauma of a previous generation, it is burdensome to care for, but it is ours to do. Is a responsibility.
It’s not just that Howell is waking up to the idea that he now has to feel the consequences of his actions, but also the consequences of his caring. His care for Sophie and the family around her. Love is as heavy a burden as pain or guilt. More than anything, this is what speaks to the important elements in Miyazaki’s work. We see the impact of artistry and how our love and emotional bonds influence who we become and what we create in light of it.
In many ways, “Howl’s Moving Castle” — which is celebrating its 20th anniversary — feels like a perfect mash-up of his old and new work. Sophie, who has become a 90-year-old woman after being cursed by the Witch of the Ruin, represents the duality of being both young and old and experiences a certain wisdom with age that empowers her. This differs from “The Boy and the Heron”, where the wisdom of age comes with fear for the future. Sophie enjoys the lack of expectations of being a young woman in the body of a 90-year-old. Meanwhile, Grand Uncle, a key figure in “Heron”, experiences a great, seismic panic about the future due to him all the days of his life.
Howl loses his ties to humanity when he transforms into a bird-like creature to intervene between both sides of the war taking place in “Howl”. This is in contrast to Jiro in “The Wind Rises”, who regrets that the plane of his dreams was used for war. The film itself is stunning, a visual spectacle that perfectly blends everything Miyazaki has helped the filmmaker hone in his recent output.
Thematic core beliefs and stylistic choices connect all of his work – from environmentalism to the inevitable persistence of time, the hope found in companionship and his interest in aviation – but his recent films serve as a coda to his long career.
“The Wind Rises” and “The Boy and the Heron” are two sides of the same coin. Cynical vs esoteric. Intellectual vs emotional. Two very different films trying to grapple with similar ideologies about what we leave behind. Both represent the highs and lows of careers, belief systems and artistry. “The Wind Rises” deals with where our passions lead us and, ultimately, what our creations leave behind. It is a meditation on how a person’s dreams can pave the way to destruction or salvation.
“The Boy and the Heron”, arguably his most personal, serves as an ode to his current regrets and a meditation on life, culminating in surprising catharsis. Without being particularly mournful, sadness permeates every crevice of “The Boy and the Heron.” His heart, here, is in undoubted loss. Loss of a loved one’s time, and possible loss of innocence due to corruption. From the moment Mahito lost his mother, running through the city frightened by panicked screams, he has lost part of his innocence. His heart is heavy now as he navigates this ever-changing world.
Perhaps the best depiction of his current state of mind is the curtain raiser to “Hayao Miyazaki and the Heron,” which details his long and tumultuous experience in bringing the 2023 film to life. It is also here that we understand the pain that reveals, presents and wounds itself in the film. In “Heron”, Mahito mourns his mother. Through the film, Miyazaki mourns the friends and rivals who are leaving him behind and disappearing from his life.
His reminiscences are largely spent talking about fellow filmmaker Isao Takahata (“Grave of the Fireflies,” “The Tale of the Princess Kaguya”) and Studio Ghibli chief animator and color designer Michiyo Yasuda — the latter of whom Wale inspired him to direct “Heron”.
He grapples with grief as he struggles with his age; His daily walk is interspersed with footage of a nearby daycare where children run and play. The message is clear, created by his longtime producer, who asks, “How can he be happy with the years he has left.”
Through creation, it appears. In this case, grief drives art. Miyazaki says, “If we don’t create, there’s nothing.” And her deep desire to never rest makes her love and loss so evident in her work. This is another example of the burdensome nature of matters of the heart. We carry it with us, and it becomes heavier as we age. We stand firm, but are unable to do anything.
Perhaps that’s why the recently released animated film “Look Back,” directed by Kiyotaka Oshiyama and based on Tatsuki Fujimoto’s manga, seems so influential when thinking about Miyazaki and his legacy. “Look Back” also deals with the world of artists and the path they set ahead, as two young girls face the endless obstacles of being creative in a constantly changing field. When we see the protagonist Fujino hunched over her desk day after day as she strives for perfection, it presents an image very similar to that of “Heron”. In the latter, we see Mahito sitting at his desk and composer Joe Hisaishi’s expressive “Ask Me Why” plays for a second time, as he finds a book left for an older Mahito by his late mother titled ” How do you live?”
How do you live? Leaned on a table. How do you live? Through our connections, our peers and loved ones who support and challenge us. How do you live? We live through the infinite life force of art. Much of Miyazaki’s later work deals with how we think about life’s constraints and the passage of time, particularly what binds us to the past and helps us move toward the future. Miyazaki’s films show how we are responsible for creating the universe we want to live in and seek life without malice or greed. And yet the tone of “Princess Mononoke” and “Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind” is a sharp contrast to that of “The Wind Rises” and “The Boy and the Heron.” Perhaps because the latter two are shaken by the burden of loss.
In many ways, “Howl’s Moving Castle” is Miyazaki’s most mainstream. And yet, 20 years later, it is easy to see how this was a turning point in his career. While he has focused on older heroes of the past — notably, “Porco Rosso,” “Howl,” in turn, feels like a strong pivot to the stories he tries to tell with a distinct perspective shift. Are doing. With such limitless limitations in mind, “Howl” brings such spark and light to a war-torn world. But this is the line that ties the film and Miyazaki’s filmography together.
Of course, many lines from his films speak to similar themes. But this sense of urgency nestled in your chest, the need of the heart and how we use it – for good, for others who can’t, in the pursuit of creativity – is the core of his most recent works, and they Everyone is more powerful because of it.
Between the kingdom of dreams in “The Wind Rises” and the bridge of life, death and madness in “The Boy and the Heron”, Miyazaki lays bare his beating and weary heart. The sheer grandeur of his animation belies a simple truth – we all become stories for someone else to share, to mourn, if we’re lucky. What keeps us going is the art born from the heaviness we endure.