“The Boy and the Heron,” by Japanese animator Hayao Miyazaki. Credit: Studio Ghibli via TNS
Studio Ghibli, the famous Japanese animation studio founded by animators Isao Takahata and Hayao Miyazaki, boasts a wildly successful catalog of 22 movies spanning several decades.
When “The Wind Rises” was released in 2013, many thought the film would serve as a poignant farewell for both the aging Miyazaki and the studio as a whole. But a decade later, Miyazaki has returned in surprising fashion for what is assumedly his final adieu: “The Boy and the Heron.”
Though the film possesses all the qualities of what can be expected from Studio Ghibli’s high standards, it can’t quite piece them all together into a cohesive story.
“The Boy and the Heron” follows a young Japanese boy named Mahito as he moves across the country with his father after his mother’s death in wartime Japan. As is the case with several Studio Ghibli films, Mahito’s life takes a turn to the abstract when a talking heron informs him his mother may still be alive, leading the duo to enter into an enchanted tower and fantastical alternate land.
The English-dub voice cast is star-studded, featuring familiar actors and actresses such as Mark Hamill, Florence Pugh and Willem Dafoe; but the star of the show is undoubtedly Robert Pattinson (“Twilight,” “The Lighthouse”), who makes his voice-acting debut as the Gray Heron.
Unlike most live-action actors who make the transition into voice acting and sound more or less exactly the same as they do in their previous films — cough, Chris Pratt, cough — Pattinson remarkably contorts his voice in a way that suits the Heron’s character and ensures he is an utter scene-stealer.
Apart from the Gray Heron, however, a major issue of “The Boy and the Heron” lies in its flat characters.
In stark contrast to the gorgeous, dimensional animation styles that draw from realist and impressionist movements to convey the depth of field within the film’s “real” and surrealist worlds, very little time is spent developing personality traits that make audiences want to root for the characters. Instead, they’re used as plot devices to simply usher spectators through the movie’s fantastical world.
The film’s heavy emphasis on Shinto values and Japanese folklore might partially account for this lack of character depth, as it can be difficult to adapt every intricate detail of such ancient stories.
Notably, “The Boy and the Heron” is based around the classic Japanese novel “How Do You Live?” — which is actually referenced in the film on one occasion — but its script fails to recognize that film is an intrinsically different medium from the source material, meaning it doesn’t translate as effortlessly as one might imagine.
“The Boy and the Heron” is a deeply philosophical movie that is impossible to watch without realizing it functions as a metaphor for Miayazki’s life, especially given that this is likely to be his last film. Unfortunately, the movie throws out a bunch of metaphors without giving any of them enough time to fully form.
The film’s most prevalent case of symbolism is observed through the omnipotent grand-uncle, Mahito’s ancestor who sits at the parallel universe’s endpoint and stacks blocks to keep the world in balance. Ironically, it is when viewers enter into this world that the film starts to fall apart.
The blocks seemingly serve as a metaphor for the imperfection of man, as well as Mahito’s need to recognize his flaws. Perhaps Miyazaki is aware of the film’s flaws — and on a broader scale, the imperfections of his own distinguished filmmaking career — as they’re reflected in the broken alternate realm; still, at the end of the day, the movie fails to respect the principle rules of storytelling and instead tumbles down a rabbit hole of its own philosophy.
It must also be mentioned that for as much as “The Boy and the Heron” tries to be original — and succeeds in many ways — the plot ends up being all too similar to those familiar with director Guillermo Del Toro’s masterpiece “Pan’s Labyrinth,” down to the core themes of motherhood and escape from wartime horrors.
“The Boy and the Heron” is reminiscent of Studio Ghibli’s best and brightest works, but much like the fantastical world in which it takes place, it fails to work in harmony with itself.
Phenomenal animation and a soul-aching score make it an enjoyable enough film, but for what could be the final chapter of Miyazaki’s story, it ultimately doesn’t accomplish enough to do his remarkable career full justice.
Rating: 3/5
