Porco Rosso {Kurenai no Buta / 紅の豚,1992)Hayao Miyazaki's homage to the early days of aviation and cinema, Porco Rosso tells the story of renowned Italian fighter pilot, a veteran of the First World War who has been mysteriously transformed into a pig. During The Great Depression, Porco Rosso, the 'Red Pig' makes his living as a mercenary, flying a crimson seaplane and doing battle with pirates. Things really start to get interesting for Porco when the pirates, tired of having their butts handed to them by a pig, hire Curtis, a famed American aviator, to take him down. Pursued by the Fascist military he deserted years ago, Porco gains a teenage sidekick, Fio, and takes the fight to the pirates. What follows is an epic journey of self-discovery and general badassery in the great Ghibli tradition. It's got all the hallmarks of a Miyazaki movie; strong women, flying machines, air-pirates and an undertone of the supernatural.Miyazaki has expressed interest in making a sequel. He plans to set it in the Spanish Civil War, and Porco will be older this time around.
Has Examples of
Acoustic License: Mostly averted — generally, people communicate plane-to-plane via signal lights using Morse code, as they did in real life, and Piccolo installs a rudimentary voice tube in Porco's rebuilt plane to allow him to communicate with Fio. Porco and Curtis do shout at each other plane-to-plane during their final duel, but as they're linking speech and action they don't necessarily have to hear each other to get the meaning.
A-Team Firing: Lots of bullets are fired, but no people (or pigs) are ever hit. Invoked for Porco whom Boss says won't shoot a fellow pilot in a dog-fight, but with all of the lead in the air you'd expect someone to get hit if only by accident.
Averted in the World War One flashback. You see a lot of planes go down in flames there, with no implication that the pilots survived.
Cool Plane: Porco's Savoia S-21 is one of the most beautiful planes on film and Curtis' Curtis R3C-2 is based on the airplane that Jimmy Doolittle flew to win the 1925 Schneider Cup.
Averted by the Sky Pirates motley collection of flying contraptions, though those are all caricatures of genuine aircraft as well.
Cool Shades: Porco Rosso wears these as well. You never actually see him (in present time) without them, except once - in a mirror, and he's squinting. When they break, he has such a shiner underneath that it doesn't count. So no, you never see Porco's eyes until Fio kisses him.
Completely Missing the Point: Porco tells Fio he's a known womanizer who lives on a small island in a tent. Her response? "That's OK, I like camping."
Day Of The Jackboot: There are underlying hints of this, modeled on Benito Mussolini's forces - the uniforms, parade colors and fascist emblem when Porco goes to the bank to finish reimbursing his loan are more than obvious, though.
Eagle Land: Curtis, who shifts from Flavor 1 to Flavor 2 depending upon how high his hormones are running at the moment.
Fake American: Englishman Cary Elwes does a mighty fine job as Curtis.
Homage: Porco's vision of a great procession of dead war pilots ascending to heaven in their planes was inspired by a Roald Dahl short story, incidentally providing a Genius Bonus for those who know Dahl himself was an Adriatic fighter pilot in WWII.
In Love with Love/Meet Cute: Curtis, who proposes to Gina and Fio upon meeting them at different points of the film. Gina quickly refuses him in favor of Porco, while Fio's hand in marriage is set up as Curtis's prize during a duel between Porco and Curtis.
I Work Alone: Porco's refusal to join the Italian navy air force.
Jerk with a Heart of Gold: Porco constantly thinks of himself, but also has a sense of honor. He shoots down planes for a living, yet refuses to kill a pilot.
Little Stowaway: Fio on Porco's plane. She claims she needs to go with him to ensure it runs properly after the rebuild—and pretending to be his hostage may prevent the secret police from arresting her family.
Magical Realism: Porco is magically transformed into a pig, but how and why is never explained, though he has a theory for the 'why' part.
Meaningful Name: Gina is named after the G-91R aircraft's nickname, manufactured by Italian-Brazilian joint venture AMX. The series it belongs to? "Ghibli", which is where Studio Ghibli's name comes from
My Greatest Failure: A battle in which Porco survived when the rest of his squad didn't. It was only by happenstance and skill that he survived, and he retreated only after all the others had been shot down, but he still calls himself a coward.
Olive Garden: Every stereotype you know about pre-WWII Italy is milked, although it's done so well you can't complain.
Precocious Crush: 17-year-old Fio having a crush on the more middle-aged Porco. Porco says that he was 17 in 1910, and the magazine he's reading in the beginning gives the date as 1929, which would make him about 36.
Reused Character Design: Fio looks very similar to Nausicaa from Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind, another Ghibli movie; Miyazaki has a tendency to recycle character models.
Repeat After Me: A radio announcer relays a message from the pirates to Porco Rosso...as well as the sounds of their bickering after they fall over on top of each other.
Announcer: Repeat; "we're coming for you Porco Rosso, ow, ack, argh, get off me!"
The Roaring Twenties: Everywhere from Gina's flapper outfits to the plane designs.
Shaming The Mob: Fio delivers an absolutely classic example to the pirate gang by appealing to their sense of honour.
Shout Out: The new engine Piccolo installs in Porco's plane has "GHIBLI" embossed in the valve covers.
Also, the main character's real name is Marco Pagot, the Italian original author of the Sherlock Hound anime on which Miyazaki worked before he started his Studio Ghibli. Miyazaki enjoyed this work tremendously and paid homage to Mr. and Mrs. Pagot this way.
Small Name, Big Ego: Averted; Curtis initially seems to be this kind of character, but he's almost as good as he thinks he is (not quite that good though) and isn't quite the jerk he initially appears to be.
Truce Zone: Gina's Cafe Adriano. Both pirates and pigs enter, but neither make any trouble inside; when it looks like the pirate gangs are about to start a fight, all it takes is a bit of gentle chiding from Gina and they're falling over themselves like bashful kids.
Unfortunate Names: When your gang's name (Mamma Aiuto) means "Help me, Mommy!", you're not going to get much respect.
The Unreveal: The origin of Porco's curse, though his guilt stemming from the death of his best friend (and Gina's late husband) in the war may be the cause of it. It serves more as a symbol of his disillusionment and cynicism than anything else.
Wall Crawl: Curtis seems to be surprisingly good at this, scaling the walls of Gina's garden, and descending the cliff into Porco's Island hideout.
She is 17, and Curtis can't be much older if he still looks young in the 1940s.
Wimp Fight: Porco's and Curtis' post air duel boxing match quickly devolves into this: by the end of six rounds both men are so tired they don't even try to block each other's punches. This is not the case with the preceding air battle, which awes all observers and ends only after Curtis runs out of ammunition and Porco's gun jams.
Wrench Wench: Fio and Piccolo Aviation's all-female workforce.
Wrong Genre Savvy: Played with. Fio suggests that if she kisses Porco, his curse might be lifted. She kisses him at the end of the film too, but Porco's curse isn't broken until after he and Curtis agree to distract the Italian Air Force, implying that the curse was truly broken when Porco finally let go of his cynicism and disillusionment, or when he finally started thinking of other people.
Porco Rosso {Kurenai no Buta / 紅の豚,1992)Hayao Miyazaki's homage to the early days of aviation and cinema, Porco Rosso tells the story of renowned Italian fighter pilot, a veteran of the First World War who has been mysteriously transformed into a pig. During The Great Depression, Porco Rosso, the 'Red Pig' makes his living as a mercenary, flying a crimson seaplane and doing battle with pirates. Things really start to get interesting for Porco when the pirates, tired of having their butts handed to them by a pig, hire Curtis, a famed American aviator, to take him down. Pursued by the Fascist military he deserted years ago, Porco gains a teenage sidekick, Fio, and takes the fight to the pirates. What follows is an epic journey of self-discovery and general badassery in the great Ghibli tradition. It's got all the hallmarks of a Miyazaki movie; strong women, flying machines, air-pirates and an undertone of the supernatural.Miyazaki has expressed interest in making a sequel. He plans to set it in the Spanish Civil War, and Porco will be older this time around.
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