HOWL'S MOVING CASTLE (2004) Dir. Hayao Miyazaki U.S BLU-RAY REVIEW

Anime time again courtesy of Shawn Francis, this time Shawn takes a look at the U.S Blu-Ray release of Studio Ghibli's HOWL'S MOVING CASTLE from the Japanese Disney, Hayao Miyazaki. It's a wonderful film and for U.K readers, you can already get this film on Blu-Ray over here. Check out Shawn's review after the jump....


Written By Shawn Francis

Apparently when I was in high school I had seen a Hayao Miyazaki film and didn’t know it. Nausicaa Of The Valley Of The Wind (1984) ran on HBO back in spring of 1986, back then, though, it was the truncated American version, Warriors Of The Wind. I think it goes without saying that I was amazed by the animation, and then with the story. The scenes in the Toxic Jungle were the best. Not a fan of everything he does, my next encounter with a Miyazaki film was in the early to mid 2000s when one Sunday afternoon I came across Spirited Away (2001). It was one of those films where I was instantly transfixed by. Based on that viewing I suddenly wanted to see his Princess Mononoke (1997), and didn’t end up seeing that one until some time later when I found the DVD at Wal-Mart. Another winner. I can’t recall precisely when I saw Howl’s Moving Castle (2004), but I do recall it was another one I caught on cable.

In this Victorian era world, wizards and witches are commonplace. For a teen named, Sophie, she’s heard of two, the Witch of the Waste and Howl. Howl lives in a “castle” that moves around on four mechanical chicken legs. He is rumored to woo attractive girls and then eat their hearts.

Sophie inadvertently encounters him when two soldiers harass her. Yes, there’s a war going on in this world, where both sides employ wizards and witches, and any kind of “magic-user” has a duty to report and serve. There’s also some kind of “dispute” going on between the Witch of the Waste and Howl, and Sophie has inadvertently gotten herself mixed up in it. Guilty by association the Witch visits her one-day and curses her with a spell that ages her into her golden years. It also curses her to the point where she’s forbidden to talk about.

She goes into the waste to find the witch in hopes of getting her to reverse it but encounters a scarecrow instead. It doesn’t talk, it just hops around on the pole it was put upon, and this scarecrow leads her to Howl’s moving castle. Here she sets herself up as the cleaning lady. We also meet Califer, a fire demon that keeps the fireplace burning and the house moving. If he goes out, the castle falls apart and Howl dies. We also meet a Markl, a little boy, who’s training to be a wizard.

After having met Howl we eventually get the impression he knows about Sophie’s curse, and we watch as Sophie slowly falls in love with him. During the course of the movie we also see Sophie inexplicably grows young again, but she doesn’t seen to comment on the changes we the viewer see.

Howl’s problem is that he’s trying to avoid this war, and the Witch of the Waste, too, and he does this by moving his castle about and using a magical door with a knob where each corresponding color it’s turned to will open it up to a different place in the country. Most of these places are shops he owns under assumed names where he helps the local populace.

War, however, manages to pull him in and he “participates” by taking the form of a great bird, sometimes a man-bird. It’s this war that threatens to split his family up, and kill him, if he’s not careful.

By the end, Howl’s moving castle is no more, the Witch of the Waste has her powers drained rendering her a normal human, who’s really about as old as the curse she put on Sophie, and Howl himself must come to grips with something he did when he was a boy that only Sophie can help him with.

The movie comes in a combo (DVD & Blu-Ray), and the aspect ratio of both is 1.85:1. The blu is in a 1080p high definition, with an audio configuration that gives you the choice of an English dub or the original Japanese language, both in 5.1 DTS HD, or a French track that is 5.1 Dolby Digital enabled. Subtitles are included—English, English SDH and French.

Extras for the blu-ray are as follows:

Behind the Microphone (9:02): A nice behind-the-scenes of the actors and the filmmakers adding their voices and their talent to the characters.

Interview with Pixar Animation Studios Director, Pete Docter (7:22): Pete Doctor is interviewed giving us insight into what he thought of the movie. Of all Miyazaki’s flicks, he likes this one the best.

Hello Mr. Lasseter: Hayao Miyazaki Visits Pixar Animation Studios (16:29): I really dug this featurette. Seeing Miyazaki blow everyone’s minds at Pixar when he unexpectedly showed up. He went to shake the director’s hand, but got a big hug instead.

Original Japanese TV Spots and Trailers (8:15): Fairly self-explanatory, so is the next featurette, Original Japanese Storyboards (1:59:02). Rounding out the blu-ray and the DVD are trailers for The Many Adventures Of Winnie The Pooh, The Little Mermaid. Monsters University and Iron Man & Hulk: Heroes United.

The standard DVD has all of these extras except for the Original Japanese Storyboards.

Looking forward to the eventual blu-ray releases, whenever that may be of, Spirited Away and Princess Mononoke.