YOU TOO LATE, I'M REVIEWING HOWL'S MOVING CASTLE

This is the first Studio Ghibli film I’ve ever finished. I’ve tried to watch Studio Ghibli films in the past and I’ve fallen asleep on all of them. Don’t think I made it past 25 minutes. 

For the entire month of August I have made it a goal to watch and complete 5 Studio Ghibli films. I dozed off on Howl’s Moving Castle 4 times while watching it. I rewinded back each time so it really took me 4 hours to watch a 2 hour movie. 

I made it though. I finished my first Studio Ghibli movie. Howl’s Moving Castle. 

So the first thing you see in this movie is a walking castle that moves like it drank too much tequila with a bunch of mismatched parts attached to it. It’s like a big ass moving pawn shop. If a crackhead saw this castle they would have a field day. 

When you see the castle for the first time it feels like the introduction of a character and I really fuck with that. It’s more than a machine or an object. 

This is an accidental love story. This is how you fall in love by accident. Watching it reminds me of the first time I ever fell in love. I mean that shit ended in disaster for me but the feeling of falling in love with someone for the first time in life could never be forgotten. 

This is a charming and funny movie. What it does really well is don’t make it obvious that they’re trying to make situations funny. For example when Sophie and The Witch Of The Waste were walking up the stairs. They were breathing harder than an offensive lineman that just ran 100 yards. There’s so many small moments that made me laugh while watching this film. 

When I read the plot of this film I thought it was kind of cheesy but not in a bad way.  A young hat maker who is turned into a 90 year old woman by a witch who enters her shop and curses her. She meets a wizard named Howl and gets caught up in his resistance to fighting for the king.

The curse is interesting. The curse reflects how old Sophie feels and the curse Witch of the Waste places on herself reflects on how young she wishes she was. There’s older people in life like The Witch of the Waste whose problems are placed at the doorstep of younger people and when younger people deal with the problems they inherit from the older generation it ages the younger people faster in an unhealthy fashion. Their youth is stolen from them. 

I like the theme underneath the surface theme where in order to break the curse Sophie has to fall in love. I think the curse broke when Sophie found joy in herself. 

If you look at the beginning of the film Sophie really believed she had nothing to look forward to. It was as if she felt she didn’t deserve good things or believed anything nice should happen in her life. 

When Sophie truly loved herself that’s when the curse broke. The less self conscious she is the more youthful Sophie became while cursed. It’s more emotional based in my opinion. The curse is a reflection of how Sophie feels about herself. Any time that Sophie felt good about herself we would see the curse go away or weaken. 

Now this is just my view and interpretation of it which leads me to one of the few issues I had with the film which is Sophie’s curse lacked context and it’s left up to the viewer to predict its inner workings. I read that this film is based on a book and I bet the curse is explained way better in the book cause that’s how books usually work. Books typically fill in the holes. 

I liked all the characters. I loved Sophie for the things I stated above about her and her curse. Howl is a character full of conflicting thoughts and his battle with how war dehumanizes him is heartbreaking. It’s also cool that you could tell that Howl knew it was Sophie when he first saw her as an elderly woman and basically made it a mission to help her break her curse. He’s very caring. 

Calcifer was my favorite character in Howl’s Moving Castle. He’s literally a heart of fire. Calcifer is a character that understands the assignment. The sarcasm. The relationships he has with the other characters. He sassy. He is a demon so he acts demonic sometimes too. The role of that abnormal/beast sidekick. He’s Howl’s Chewbacca. Calcifer moves the castle, cooks breakfast, complains all day but he really loves his life and his family. 

I just felt what I learned from this film is that no matter what you go through, the differences you possess or shortcomings you have you can always come back to love. 

If you notice towards the end of the movie Sophie tells Howl to meet her in the future. At the beginning of the movie Howl tells Sophie “Oh there you are I’ve been looking for you.” 

A good film always comes full circle. 

Love, Benny