Howl's Moving Castle

A review
Hauru no ugoku shiro

Saturday involved a trip to the Capri, a NonProfit movie theatre that brings independent and traveling film festivals into Montgomery, Alabama. Previously, I saw Princess Mononoke here, but I saw Spirited Away in Atlanta with friends. Since joining Netflix, there hasn't been as much desire to go to Montgomery to see Indy films which usually do not require a movie theatre in order to enjoy the effect of the widescreen or the surround sound in Dolby, but I really wanted to see this on the big screen, high definition sound or not.

For those that have never been to the Capri - it reminds me of several single screen movie theaters that were in Auburn when I was growing up in the seventies. The Capri Theatre has a webpage with lists of upcoming movies and directions of how to get there, etc... if you are interested.

Suffice it to say, the artwork and animation is beautiful like all of his work. Wind flowing across a flowery hill and clouds floating over crystal clear lakes - there is such attention to detail and light and shape, it puts most other animators to shame.
Now to the story.

The story begins with Sofie, a young maiden working in her mother's hatshop. At close of business one night, she sits alone working on one of the hats while the other girls in the shop get ready to go out on the town. Many soldiers are in town, and there is a celebration before the country goes to war. Way up in the hills, they see a ramshackle metal house walking on chicken legs and the girls all start talking about Howl, for this is his Moving Castle. They mention that Howl steals and eats the hearts of pretty young maidens and they keep talking as Sofie's mother comes in to ask her to go with them. She begs off, saying she has to finish her work. Her mother leaves disappointed. Sofie finishes her work soon after they are all gone, and sets off by herself towards the pub.
The city is reminiscent of Kiki's Delivery Service or perhaps Castle In the Sky. The city might could be called Victorian, but it reminds me of Western Germany before World War one, pictures of a hamlet that quickly became a city, with a railroad and tight city streets, where a room is lit by lamplight. As Sofie walks through the city, there is a grand celebration, everyone is happy, and on a side stree, she is accosted by two soldiers. Before anything could get nasty, a very handsome man steps in and rescues her, but quickly tells her as they walk away quickly that he is being followed, and that she should hold on tight. Black creatures wearing strange hats come out of the wall behind them, and they start chasing Sofie and the stranger. Soon they are in front of them, and even taking side alleys, they are quickly surrounded. At that point, the stranger jumps into the air, and they are soon walking on air to get to Sofie's destination. He leaves her there, suggesting that she wait a bit before going out, and then he floats away. Word spreads through the food establishment that Howl just landed on the balcony, dropping off a girl.
Sofie talks to her sister who works there for a bit, her sister is worried that she is in the hat business for poor reasons, and she should have fun, Sofie obviously doesn't have the self-confidence to believe that she could do anything but work in the shop, and the fact that Howl didn't eat her heart reinforces her belief that she isn't pretty. She heads back to the hat shop, but just moments after locking the door, someone comes in. This is the Witch of the Waste. She curses Sofie to appear elderly, and that she cannot tell anyone of the curse. The next morning, Sofie decides to head into the Waste to get the curse removed.
And that is the first ten minutes.


Spoilers Ahead - be warned
I enjoyed the film, which was less alien to me than Spirited Away, but it suffered from some of the same problems. Sofie's curse winked on and off and kinda fixed itself without any effort. The bond between Calcifer and Howl which had certain rules at the beginning... well, only by breaking these rules was anything accomplished. Two bad guys get brought along by Sofie because of her big heart, and there is no real resolution with the true bad person in the film, just an end to the war.

Will everyone enjoy this film? I doubt it, but if they like animation at all, they should see it just for the beautiful animation. I would give the movie four out of five stars, which would be five if the story was as high in quality as the animation.