Hello and welcome to Project Nitsuj. Let’s talk about Hayao Miyazaki. He is Japan’s highest grossing film director and has even earned the title “The Walt Disney of Japan”. He earns this title by creating masterpiece after masterpiece of animated movies that are not only enjoyable for kids but for adults as well. He has even directed two of my all-time favorite animated movies Spirited Away and The Castle of Cagliostro. But like all great directors there’s always that one hiccup, that one film that many consider to be their weakest and lowest one and I think for Miyazaki that film is Howl’s Moving Castle. Based off the book under the same name written by British writer Diana Wynne Jones, Howl’s Moving Castle has often been seen as Miyazaki’s weakest film in his career. The story centers around a girl name Sophie who was cursed by a witch, seeking to break the curse she travels and through a series of events becomes a cleaner for Howl’s castle. The film came out in 2004 and has since then generated over 230 million dollars worldwide. So I have to ask the question is Howl’s Moving Castle really Miyazaki’s lowest point in filmmaking? Well let’s take a look at Howl’s Moving Castle. Also, I would like to note that I’m reviewing the English version.
We open our film with appropriately enough a moving castle walking through the well-animated countryside with no one batting an eye at it (we’re clearly in a Miyazaki film. Weird is normal and normal is weird). We then cut to a hat shop where we meet the main protagonist of the movie Sophie voiced by Emily Mortimer. As she’s working the other workers are leaving and they see Howl’s castle moving over the horizon and wonders if he’s coming to town (you better be cute, you better wear make-up, better wear a nice dress, I’m telling you why, Howl’s Moving Castle is coming to town~). After she finishes up her work she leaves to go meet her little sister and we get a good look at the city where we see a parade for the military is happening. As she’s walking through the backstreets two officers try to hit on her much to her displeasure but luckily she’s saved by our second protagonist Howl voiced by Christian Bale (I’m Batman) who uses his magic to send the officers on their merry way. He decides to escort her to the bakery her sister works at but they’re being followed by these strange creatures who remind me of the shadows from Persona 3 if they had legs and wore hats (. . .they’re still not intimidating). They chase after them but they give them the slip by literally walking on air (and here I thought walking on cloud 9 was only a figurative meaning). He drops her off at a balcony at the bakery and tells her to stay low while he draws them away. We then get to meet her sister Lettie voiced by Jena Malone who tells her to live out her life and be careful because the Witch of the Waste is on the prowl causing trouble and since I don’t feel like writing out Witch of the Waste each time I’m just going to call her Betty. After saying goodbye to her sister she goes home where she runs her own hat store (I swear this movie has so many Purdy hats I keep expecting Linkara to show up and just punch something like a man) and gets to meet Betty voiced by Lauren Becall who has an infatuation with Howl and has pursued him for years to make him hers and sees Sophie as a rival and puts a curse on Sophie that turns her into a 90-year old lady (you see that ladies, that’s how you take out your rivals. Calling them sluts and spreading rumors behind their back? Fuck that. The next time you have a love rival you turn that bitch into an old lady). And she’s also voiced by Jean Simmons now, why the American version decided to pay two voice actors instead of just keeping the same voice actor and tell her to sound old like the Japanese version is beyond me.
The next day she sneaks out of town and head towards an area known as the Waste in the hopes of finding a witch or wizard to break the curse put on her. Along the way she helps a living scarecrow which we come to know as Turnip-Head who doesn’t talk and follows Sophie to give her a cane and then hops off after being tricked by Sophie to find a place to stay (if he only had a brain~). She walks a little more and becomes tired but Turnip-Head shows back up with Howl’s Castle. She sneaks in to the castle where she meets Calcifer a fire demon who is the power source of Howl’s Castle and keeps it moving. He’s voiced by Billy Crystal. They work out a deal that if she can break the spell he’s under he’ll the break the spell she’s under in return. We cut to the next day where we meet another resident of the castle Markl an apprentice of Howl who watches his shop while Howl’s away. He’s voiced by Josh Hutcherson. He receives a letter from the mayor of a town called Porthaven and a soldier from Kingsbury asking for Howl’s assistance in an upcoming war (what is it good for? Absolutely nothing). How did he receive two letters from different countries asking for his assistance in an upcoming war at the same time you ask? Well, it’s because the castle has a magic door that can warp to different places. Howl comes back which Sophie is surprised to see is the same guy she met the other day and makes up the story that she’s the new cleaning lady for the castle (ah no Mr. Howl not here, you come back later). She begins cleaning the house which is very messy by the way that it should be on that hoarder’s show which scares Markl who wants Sophie to do his room last (no doubt he wants to hide his porno. I know he’s 10 but still you never know). We also see that Turnip-Head somehow snuck aboard the castle (he’s like Tails from the old Sonic games he’s always popping up out of nowhere and following you except he’s not annoying). While those three are drying the laundry at a lake Howl has transformed into a birdlike creature surveying the war and fighting off more shadow creatures from the kingdoms. He returns to the castle where Calcifer warns him not to transform into a beast otherwise he won’t be able to return to normal. Also I forgot to mention that Calcifer is in possession of Howl’s heart so if he dies Howl dies and if Howl dies Calcifer dies with him (*Takei impression* oh my). With Howl back Sophie and Markl go shopping where they see a ship return to the harbor in severe damage (no doubt they were T-boned by another ship). After a bombing in the harbor they return to the castle where Howl explodes over Sophie ruining the potions in his bath which causes his hair to turn orange and eventually black. He then turns into a drama queen saying he doesn’t want to live anymore if he can’t be beautiful (shallow thy name is Howl) and he summons spirits of darkness and starts to deform into a puddle of green goo (again, shallow thy name is Howl). After Sophie throws a tantrum about never being cute her whole life she runs out in the rain and cries (this came out where, seemed force, and really makes no sense). She returns to the castle where she carries him to the bath and drops his towel ((Isis): What’s he packing down there. *I stare at her blankly* (Isis): What!? Can’t a girl be curious). After a few scenes Howl opens up to Sophie and reveals that he’s a big coward who uses his magic to keep everyone at bay (you know this sentence and scene would actually be more affective if we actually saw him doing said things but I’ll touch more on that near the end. Until then keep this in your mind). He also reveals that he used to have a thing for Betty but once he discovered her true form he backed off.
Sophie urges Howl to talk to the king of the country and tell him the war is pointless but he’s too much a coward to go. So he works out a plan in which Sophie goes posing as his mother for one of his aliases and that he’ll follow behind her for safety. As she’s walking to the palace she runs across an old dog with chicken feet (yeah, I’ll buy it. We got moving castles, shadow creatures, talking fire demons, and Christian Bale. Yeah, this isn’t out of place at all) named Heen who she confuses for Howl and is really a spy working for Suliman. She also runs into Betty and the two have a small conversation. (Betty): So what it’s like being old, granny? (Sophie): Oh, not too bad, I got a good look at Howl’s crotch. (Betty): Really!? What’s he like down there? (Sophie): That’s my little secret. (Betty): Oh, you bitch! (Nitsuj): They both work their way to the stairs where we have a humorous climb to the top from both Sophie and Betty. They make it to the top where they go to a room in which Sophie gets taken to meet the palace sorceress Suliman voiced by Blythe Danner and Betty stays in the room where her magic gets drained and she returns to her real form which is an old lady (Howl made the right call in rejecting her). The two have a chat in which Suliman reveals that Howl was her apprentice and that his heart was stolen by a demon and he abandoned his apprenticeship and started using his magic for selfish reasons (reasons that we never get the chance to see but once again I’ll save that for the end). Suliman tells Sophie that Howl has become too dangerous and must pledge his alliance with the King or he’ll have his power removed just like Betty but Sophie sees through her tricks and speaks up for Howl (Love~). The King (Howl) comes in on his. . . hover bug (I don’t know) and says that he plans on winning the war without relying on magic (instead we shall rely on SCIENCE *Dr. Insano laugh*). The real one comes in and Howl reveals himself but as he tries to leave with Sophie, Suliman transports them to an alternative world where she reveals Howls’s true form (that birdlike we saw earlier). Sophie manages to stop him from going berserk and they escape with Betty and Heen (sure, they’ll make good meat shields). While Howl throws the guards off their trail Sophie and the others make a crash landing back at the castle (literally).
Howl returns to the castle later that night still is his bird form but once morning comes around he’s all better (sleep really does restore a person’s beauty). He cast a spell that disguises the castle as a home in Sophie’s town and he added a new portal which takes them to a field of flowers. There, a flying battleship comes into the field and launches a bunch of monsters wearing hats (what is with the monsters wearing hats in this film? Is Miyazaki trying to tell us something because I’m seriously confused). He manages to get Sophie through the door to safety and goes off to fight Suliman’s forces. Suliman’s forces eventually find them and attack their home with bombs (duck and cover). Howl shows up and stops a bomb from striking Sophie and after getting her to safety she says they should runaway but Howl says he’s through running and wants to protect his family and the woman he loves (alright good gestures but still they are literally trying to bomb you and are sending monsters with hats which I still don’t get after you. Get them all to safety and then you can go all Stone Cold 3:16 on them). Sophie teleports them back to the Waste and they decide to abandon the castle which collapses right in front of them. They go back into the castle (I’m confused too just roll with it) and she tells Calcifer to move the castle to where Howl is but he can’t do it alone and needs a little more power so Sophie lets Calcifer eat her hair which gives him Super Saiyan powers and he gets the castle moving once again (I’m strong to the finish cause I eat women’s hair, I’m Calcifer the fire demon *puff puff*). As they make their way to Howl Betty has gone full senile on us that she takes Calcifer from the stove to get Howl’s heart (do I even need to explain how stupid she is at this point). She squeezes the heart which starts to burn her intensely leaving Sophie no choice but to grab a bucket of water to prevent Betty from burning alive which douses Calcifer making him weak that half the castle falls apart and takes Sophie off a cliff.
She survives the fall and with the ring she got from Howl earlier that leads her to wherever he is she finds the portal door where it leads her to the past where we see a young Howl catch a falling star, eat it (* cue Mario starman music*) and give birth to what we can only presume is Calcifer. She returns back to her time where we see Howl in his complete monster form waiting for her and he takes her to Calcifer where she takes Calcifer and puts him back into Howl which frees Calcifer and saves Howl’s life. They go falling off a cliff but Turnip-Head jumps in front of them and stops them from going off the cliff. She kisses Turnip-Head which breaks the curse placed on him and he reveals himself to be Prince Justin (no it’s not me, trust me, if it was you would know) the prince of the neighboring country they’re at war with. He returns to his home country to order a cease fire as well as Suliman. So the war is over, Calcifer returns, they rebuild the castle, they fly off into the sky with the curse on Sophie broken (though she still has silver hair) and Sophie and Howl get together as we end with them kissing.
Book vs. Film
Before we get to the final thoughts and score I would like to discuss the differences between the book and film. Miyazaki made a lot of changes to the film that are very different from the book the movie is based off of. If I had to describe these changes I would say that Miyazaki was trying to add his own ideas and philosophies to the story while still trying to be true to the source material. Now some of these changes work while others don’t. Let’s start by looking at the characters but before that I like to point out the biggest change that I think everyone should know. The war in the film never happened. In the book there is no war going on whatsoever and to be honest the war feels out of place in the film. We never focus on it long enough to see people getting hurt or action happening, all we see is Howl flying around in his bird form and fighting a few shadow creatures, that’s it, then will cut back to Sophie and the residents of the castle or Howl returning exhausted. The war was completely out of place and was a complete distraction from the main story. So why did Miyazaki but it in there? Well it’s because around the time production of the film was getting started we were going to war with Iraq and if you know anything about Miyazaki you should know that he hates war, he is a pacifist when it comes to political views and when we went to war he was pissed so that’s why the war is in the film instead of the actual plot from the book that I’ll get to later.
The characters are largely different from the book. For example Sophie, in the film she’s kind, innocent, knows her feelings well, considered a neat-freak, kind of shy and reclusive, and has no magic abilities whatsoever. In the book however, Sophie is more badass, she’s tells it like it is, stubborn, easily irritated, vulnerable, uses cleaning as a way to escape her problems, and has magic abilities that she doesn’t know about. Another change is her hair color, in the book she has ginger hair and in the movie she has brown hair. I kinda like the book version more because she seems more human and realistic. She knows she’s in a big problem and she would like nothing more than to escape it, she feels vulnerable and scared but she’s too stubborn to show it to others so she hides it through irritation. Her magic abilities are also amazing, she can breathe life into anything in the book she uses her powers to bring life into hats and her walking stick. I will admit her movie version is good as well, I just don’t like it as much as I like the book version.
Howl is also very different, in the movie he’s a pacifist and a coward who hates war and tries to avoid it at all cost (once again Miyazaki’s philosophy at work here). In the book, I’m not gonna sugarcoat it, Howl is a flirt, he goes into various towns and flirts with girls on a regular basis to make them fall in love with him and when the girl returns her love for him he skips town and goes to the next because he can’t fall truly in love because of a curse the Witch of the Waste put on him. He’s still a great wizard in the book and works for the King but he avoids contact with them as much as he can. He’s also a much bigger drama queen in the book then he is in the film. That one scene where his hair gets turned black and his reaction to it was a lot more dramatic and silly in the book (I swear the guy is like Tamiki from Ouran High Host Club only with magic). He’s also from modern 1980’s Wales; he somehow came across the portal door and left our world to study magic in Sophie’s world. In the movie the portal door has four dials, each one leading to a different place. One of them is black which leads to nothing but darkness but in the book it leads back to Wales. Once again it’s a shame Miyazaki didn’t focus more on the book Howl because that Howl is more fun and interesting than the Howl in the film. In the film we rarely get to know anything about him. Sure, we see him interact with Sophie and the residents of the castle but we never got the chance to see how he interacted with other people in the real world like women, men, children, animals, and nature; remember that scene I talked about with him telling Sophie that he’s a coward who uses magic to keep others at bay and how it falls flat? Well, that’s why that scene falls flat; we never see him interact with world, if there was a scene where he was flirting with a group of girls or turning a girl down then that scene would have had more effect but instead we just focus on Howl fighting in a war he doesn’t want to be in and not explore him as a normal person. Speaking of which, that bird form he takes to fight, doesn’t happen in the book.
The Witch of the Waste is a lot more terrifying in the book then in the film. In the film they replace her as the main antagonist halfway with Suliman (more on her later) and turn her into a senile old lady. In the book she’s the antagonist all the way and is very pretty mean. At the beginning when she curses Sophie she mistakes Sophie for her sister Lettie that Howl was flirting with and seeking to gain information about where he went. When Sophie couldn’t give any answers the Witch got mad and cursed Sophie. She curses Howl to not fall in love because if he does he’ll have to give himself to her. Her master plan in the book is to use Howl as a sacrifice along with Prince Justin and Suliman who she kidnapped to create the perfect boyfriend. She also implants a number of tasks in the curse that Howl has to follow, one of them was actually catching a falling star and eating it to increase his magical power which created Calcifer. Again, the book version is better I like how evil she acts in the book she knows what she wants and is determined to get it no matter what. Much like Howl we never really get the chance to explore her character in the film. The only menacing thing we see her do is turn Sophie into an old lady and that’s it. The next time we see her she’s having a hard time climbing stairs, getting turn into an old lady and becomes the senile comic relief character that we really didn’t need.
Aside from the three main characters the film changed a lot of the side characters. For starters Sophie has two younger sisters, Lettie and Martha. Markl is called Michael in the book, 15 years old, and has a crush on Martha. Suliman is actually a man in the book, who comes from Wales like Howl, not evil, and is a powerful wizard who goes missing after fighting the Witch of the Waste. Howl’s teacher wasn’t Suliman as well, it was actually a lady named Mrs. Penstemmon who gives Sophie clues on how to break Howl’s curse, free Calcifer and Howl from their contract and is killed by the Witch of the Waste. Turnip-Head wasn’t alive when Sophie met him. Sophie unconsciously used her magic to breathe life into him which frightens her greatly, isn’t Prince Justin, can actually speak, and is simply known as “the scarecrow” (hopefully not the one I’m thinking about otherwise Sophie is in deep shit). Heen is not in the book at all. He replaces a character known as Percival who is called the dog-man because he was cursed to be a dog. Calcifer for the most part serves the same purpose for the book as he did in the film.
As I mention earlier the story is different in each. The book focuses more on Howl’s womanizing and trying to escape his curse while the film focuses more on him being a pacifist and wanting to avoid war at all cost. So why did Miyazaki change so much? My guess, he was furious about the war with Iraq and wanted to show his political view by using the story of Howl’s Moving Castle. While not a bad idea I still feel he should have focus on the characters more instead of the aspects of war and should have dropped in a subtle line from Howl saying how war is pointless and how we should try to solve things peacefully and use violence as a last resort.
Final Thoughts
Now I know what you’re thinking, with all these changes I bet Nitsuj hates this movie. Well you’re wrong, I like it. Oh, trust me, I think he should have stuck to the source material and focus on the characters instead of war which would had made the film at 10 times better but if I look at the film by itself instead of comparing it to the book it holds up well. So you’re probably wondering why I didn’t judge Mahou Sensei Negima as just an anime instead of comparing it to the manga. Well the answer to that question is I tried to do that but it just didn’t work like it does for this film. For this film Miyazaki was using it to tell his own story by borrowing characters from Jones’ book. He’s not looking down on them or misinterpreting them in anyway. They still have their own problems, the story is centering around them, the plot and message are just different from the book. Miyazaki wasn’t trying to re-tell Jones story he was trying to tell his own story while paying respect to the book. Negima on the other was actually trying to do an animated interpretation of the manga step by step and they failed horribly. The order of events that happen in the anime were different from the manga, they did a bad job representing some characters, added in events and settings that were either stupid and didn’t work so well as they had hope, and once again they had so much story in the manga to work with at the time production began that it really makes no sense why they would derail themselves from the story near the end and put in this half-ass ending that had no build-up and came out of nowhere.
There are some things that are still good in the film such as Sophie being a sweet and innocent character who has her funny moments and can be quite strong and brave in the face of danger. Howl is a likable and sympathetic character. Chances are you have or will be in a similar situation where you’re too afraid to do something so you hide or run away from it by keeping your mind on something else or doing something that distracts you from the problem you’re facing. Surprisingly, Bale does a good job at voicing Howl, his voice really does fit the character of Howl well. I’m pretty impressed by it, I wish he did as good a job voicing Batman as he did Howl it would have made the Batman trilogy a little more likable. The animation is amazing, it’s what you would expect from Miyazaki and his team, the landscapes are beautiful they capture the beauty of nature perfectly, the towns are well designed, but the best animated feature in the movie is Howl’s castle. My God, that castle is awesome I was at a loss for words when I first saw it, I wasn’t expecting it to be so machine-like and creative but it works in the end it totally fits in with the world the movie takes place in. Another thing I liked about the film is the animated representation of Sophie and Howl fighting against their curses. I like how Sophie gradually changes from old to young and back to old depending on her mood and I like how the bird form of Howl shows how he’s slowly allowing the curse to control him and losing the fight against it. These events don’t happen in the book but I thought it was a creative and interesting way to show their struggles and fights against their curses.
As I said before the bad parts are they sacrifice character focus and development in favor of focusing on the war, dumb-down a pretty menacing villain in the book into a senile old lady, and changed or left out a number of side characters that were good. If Miyazaki had focused more on the characters in this film like he did in his previous ones this film would have been spectacular and arguably one of his best. But instead he decided to turn it into an anti-war film and look over the characters and that makes this film his weakest one yet when compared to the others in my opinion.
Final Score
The final score for Howl’s Moving Castle is a 6/10. If you want to see the story focus more on the characters I recommend reading the book. If you like the film you’ll love the book. It’s still a good movie and well worth checking out if you have time, the visuals are amazing, the voice work is top-notch and the message is loud and clear. Just don’t expect to be blown away as you have been in his previous films. This film may not be Miyazaki’s best work but it’s still worth watching. It’s like Doug said after reviewing Ponyo; even on his worst day Miyazaki can film something better then Michael Bay on his best day. Thanks for reading and I’ll see you next time on Project Nitusj.
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