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Reviewed by Park Cooper Ponyo is a sweet, wonderful film that was not created for you. It was created for a five-year-old. We saw it in the theater on Sunday. We liked it, but there were a couple of hmm moments, such as the ending. You're watching the movie, and enjoying it, and near the end you're like "Really, movie? You're going to end that way?" and then sure enough, it ends just that way. It is not a shocking or surprising ending. There is such a lack of twist to the ending that it will almost feel to you that it's some sort of mind-bending reverse-twist, but it's not. It's you. You're expecting a twist or something, and it's just not going to oblige you. Ponyo, also known as Ponyo on the Cliff by the Sea, is about a magical little fish (female). Some time ago, a magical guy fell in love with the goddess of mercy, who may be Mother Earth, or a goddess of the sea, or more than one of the above... you get the idea. He has lots of potions and elixirs that he works on carefully so that some day he can restore the ocean to the vitality of life it had millions of years ago. He hates humans and their polluty ways. He has a school of little fish-daughters, however, and one of them, Brunhilde (there's a great moment when she busts loose Ride-of-the-Valkyries style, complete with very similar music), loves the surface world. She meets a little five-year-old boy (who renames her Ponyo), who helps her get free when she accidentally gets a jar stuck on her head. Dad comes and gets her back, but there's no stopping the love these two have for each other. Boy and pet fish, girl and boy, it doesn't matter: love is love, and this, baby, is love. The entire middle of the movie concerns what happens after Ponyo re-escapes from her dad's place and goes off to find her boy again... and finds him... it just rocks. It's terrific. The best part of this movie is the whole movie except for the first 14 mins or so and the last 8 mins or so. But that's because YOU (and I) want it to kick into high gear just a teensy bit faster, and because you and I see how it will end. But this movie was not made for you nor I. This movie was made for five-year-olds, and it's just so good, you'll probably enjoy it too. But only 30 mins after we saw it, Barbara's brain had it figured out: this is a children's movie. And a look on the Studio Ghibli website confirmed it: the old master wanted to do a children's movie for little children, but he got caught up in doing Howl's Moving Castle instead. Everyone always hopes for another TOTORO from him, so they were like what the heck? This made the old master sad, and somewhat sick, and he had to go live very simply in a little house on a cliff by the sea for months... which led to Ponyo. Take young people to go see Ponyo, or just go yourself. But don't judge it like an adult. "Ponyo does not have themes," said one Ghibli member, and I understood what he meant (oh it has themes, like the whole environmental thing; he meant, like, complicated English-major themes). It's simple. It's meant to be experienced either BY children or LIKE a child. Engage your sense of wonder. It took me back to my childhood, and touched my heart, and I lived in a landlocked county, people, hundreds of miles from the ocean, then and now. But it's funny, and it's sweet, and it's great. It breaks down about like this: Panda Go Panda: perfect for a 3 year old Ponyo: for a 5 year old My Neighbor Totoro: for a 7 year old The Cat Returns: for maybe a 7 or 8 year old Kiki's Delivery Service: for an 8 or 9 year old Spirited Away: 9 or 10 years old perhaps(?) So there you go. Go see Ponyo, and share it with the young people. Think you could have written a better review of Movie Review: Ponyo? Write us and we'll probably let you give it a shot! --EiC PC |
6 October 2009
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