The Wind Rises, the animated feature by Hayao Miyazaki, is a movie which entrances, pulls you in, almost without your realizing it. It is startlingly beautiful, its backgrounds of the Japanese countryside in particular, and its spectacular cloudscapes.
If you’re like me, you may be disappointed, initially, by this style of animation. Characters mouths, for example, are rendered by no more than a curved line. The images seem flat, and the lack of detail, especially in human figures is a little disconcerting. Certainly this style of animation can in no way compare to the bold, shadowed, hyper-real images from studios like Dream Works and Pixar which are quickly becoming the expected 'norm' in animated features nowadays.
If you’re like me, you may be disappointed, initially, by this style of animation. Characters mouths, for example, are rendered by no more than a curved line. The images seem flat, and the lack of detail, especially in human figures is a little disconcerting. Certainly this style of animation can in no way compare to the bold, shadowed, hyper-real images from studios like Dream Works and Pixar which are quickly becoming the expected 'norm' in animated features nowadays.
The Wind Rises begins with a dream, ends with a dream, and has a dreamlike quality throughout, such that a viewer feels almost hypnotised while watching. Two great loves dominate the story: the love of Jiro for planes and his deep desire to design them, and the love Jiro later discovers for the beautiful but sickly Naoko whom eventually he marries. Both Jiro and Naoko are completely loveable characters, to a degree where many viewers might find them impossibly good, unrealistic. But I don’t think such things matter in a dream. The characters are archetypes as much as anything. So are its villains. That is not to imply there is no subtlety in the characters, but they are rendered like quick splashes of paint, meant only to be suggestive—the point of the movie is to push the dream forward.
Disney’s film Frozen won this year’s Academy Award for best animated feature. It was a good film, if predictable. The animation was first class, the script brisk and entertaining, enjoyable both for children and adults. But really, it does not belong in the same category with The Wind Rises. There should be a separate category for thoughtful adult animated features which The Wind Rises surely is.
The film's very talented protagonist is hired to design Japan’s new fighter jet, later to be known famously as the “Zero”. Much is made of the fact that Japan, as a nation, feels backward at this time in history, and is shamed by its obsolete technology. In the society of obedience that Jiro has grown up in, great honour is attached to lifting the shame. The idea of refusing to design the fighter, to design “a beautiful dream” could never realistically enter Jiro’s head.
Of course the movie does make reference to the horrors of World War II. How could it not? Very near the end of the film we see another dream, a nightmare, which shows an endless vista of fire and carnage, the result, in part, of Jiro’s Zero fighter plane. Clearly Jiro feels regret, and dismay at the vision. Again, Caproni speaks to Jiro, asking, “Do you prefer a world with pyramids, or with no pyramids?” For the word ‘pyramid' you could substitute the word, ‘fighter jet’ or ‘rocket’ or ‘nuclear physics’.
Of course the movie does make reference to the horrors of World War II. How could it not? Very near the end of the film we see another dream, a nightmare, which shows an endless vista of fire and carnage, the result, in part, of Jiro’s Zero fighter plane. Clearly Jiro feels regret, and dismay at the vision. Again, Caproni speaks to Jiro, asking, “Do you prefer a world with pyramids, or with no pyramids?” For the word ‘pyramid' you could substitute the word, ‘fighter jet’ or ‘rocket’ or ‘nuclear physics’.
This story really resonates with me, in part, no doubt, because my own novel, Lunatics (unpublished) makes Wernher von Braun the protagonist, the same man who designed the V-2 rocket which killed civilians in London, but who also designed the Saturn V rocket which took astronauts to the moon.
It is a deep question: can people who design weapons of war in any way be protagonists? Should we rein in these ‘beautiful dreams’ because of the dark consequences that may accompany them?
Frozen is a film I really haven’t thought about since seeing it in the theatre; The Wind Rises, on the other hand, is one I suspect will haunt me for some time to come.
I highly recommend it. 9/10
It is a deep question: can people who design weapons of war in any way be protagonists? Should we rein in these ‘beautiful dreams’ because of the dark consequences that may accompany them?
Frozen is a film I really haven’t thought about since seeing it in the theatre; The Wind Rises, on the other hand, is one I suspect will haunt me for some time to come.
I highly recommend it. 9/10
