Howling Mistake
Hayao Miyazaki 2004 adaptation of Diana Wynne Jones' 'Howl's Moving Castle' is an incoherent mess. Given that Jones' novel was a convoluted and confusing tale of wizards and witches, at the conclusion, every detail and bit in the plot was tied up and explained. Everything fitted perfectly in the novel, but Miyazaki's work of animation was a visual feast of loose ends which not only changed the plot but made little sense whatsoever.
For instance, who turned the prince into a scarecrow? Why were Howl and the Witch of the Wastes feuding? Why was there a war? Who and what was fighting? If Howl was defending the cities from foreign attack, why then would Mrs. Suleimen want to capture Howl? These are just the beginning of the loose bits in the film and this is coming from a person who has read the novel and also other works from Jones.
At the end of the film, the end of the war was explained away by Mrs Suleiman saying with sigh, 'In which case, let's call off the war...' WHAT?!?
Doh. As much as I am a fan of a lot of Miyazaki's previous work, I enjoyed the visuals of this most recent effort of his. The townscapes, the castle design, the costumes, the pre-dreadnoughts and ironclads, the flying machines. 'Spirited Away' is a masterpiece. 'Howl's Moving Castle' is a disaster of the first magnitude.
4 comments:
Both Brian and I also went "Duh!" after we watched it. It was sort of like having gone thru the entire foreplay and when you were about to get down and do the real thing, the girl suddenly vanished.
Ha ha--funny analogy Darth (though I haven't yet seen the film). Yeah, I heard the plot was very confusing in the film, which is a shame, because I too love "Spirited Away" and "Princess Mononoke", as well as "Nausica". Well, I guess I'll have to check it out if not to see the visuals. Too bad the plot got such lousy reviews.
Yeah, that's exactly the way I felt when I came out of the movie theatre. Since I haven't read the book I had no expectations, and the visuals were amazing. But... WTF.
I see.
No wonder I found it confusing.
In the end I thought that the story was just about breaking the spell tying the fire demon to Howl.
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