The Wind Rises
Hayao Miyazaki
Hayao Miyazaki
126 min.
Zach Callison, Mirai Shida, Hideaki Anno, Jun Kunimura, Miori Takimoto, Steve Alpert, Hidetoshi Nishijima, Masahiko Nishimura, Mansai Nomura, Mario Kazama
PG-13 for some disturbing images and smoking
There are few filmmakers working today who have earned the level of acclaim that Japanese animation master Hayao Miyazaki has. With The Wind Rises, his many fans around the world are faced with the bittersweet reality that this will be his last film. A perfect finale to a legendary career.
For his career, Miyazaki has taken the “coming of age” story and turned into brilliant examinations of life, love and happiness. His characteristic appreciation of the beauty of nature and its preseveration have been an equally potent element to his films. His characters live in worlds that seem familiar, but who adventure into mysterious fantastical landscapes where monsters and spirits threaten and teach the protagonists how to appreciate their humdrum realities while embracing the creative outlets childhood has to offer even as they grow into adulthood and abandon childish things.
It’s a bit surprising then that Miyazaki’s final film only briefly deals with the coming of age of his young protagonist. Set initially during the devastating earthquake that struck Tokyo in 1923, Jiro Horkoshi is a practical young man, the trademark fantasies of Miyazaki only emerge in his mind while he’s asleep where the fantastical world of aviation spreads out before him in vacant fields of waving grass and massive aeronautical feats. Guided through his dreams by his idol Gianni Caproni (Mansai Nomura), Jiro dreams of one day become a great designer of airplanes and its from there, he grows up, goes to school and graduates with an engineering degree, all with an eye bent towards creating beautiful constructs influenced by the simple, elegant bones of fish.
Miyazaki has never shied away from adult themes, but the level of complexity on display in The Wind Rises accentuates his ability to convey complex ideas and concepts with the precision and solemnity of a master filmmaker. Jiro realizes as he examines German warplanes and supports his friend’s attempt to build a fighter jet, that he lives in a time where his dreams may lead to death and destruction, much like the fires that raged about him during the earthquake of his youth. Jiro has unfortunately been born into a time of impending war and although he regrets and abhors the uses for which his creations will eventually be used, he cannot abandon his pursuit of technological innovation built on the backbone of nature.
This meditation on difficult choices, societal contribution and pursuit of passion may seem to some like an advocation of technology being used to kill and destroy, but Jiro’s dreams showcase his unwavering belief that perhaps one day his work will be used for joy and excitement even though the realities begin creeping into his dream. Miyazaki guides us through Jiro’s life and his love, the horrific background looming over each scene like a dangerous storm ready to crack open at any minute. The film is filled with gorgeous imagery suggesting the horrors of war without directly presenting them.
His planes are not unlike the playtoys of children, each has a voice, a motorized whirr provided by voice actors. Our childhood innocence wrapped up in the imaginings of youth. This heavily stylized film may have Miyazaki’s strongest ties to reality ever employed, but his childlike wonder still abounds and perhaps technology has been used for evil, that does not mean that we cannot find beauty and art in their construction.
Miyazaki has never created a film that’s more personal than The Wind Rises, his characters’ metaphorical finale matching his own. There are few masters who get the opportunity to go out on such a magnificent high. Thankfully, Miyazaki has.
Guarantees: Animated Feature
December 9, 2013
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