The Wind Rises

So there's a new Hayao Miyazaki film coming out today. I'm trying to decide if I want to go see it.

This movie is expanding theaters this weekend. I plan to see it tomorrow morning.

We'll be waiting for general impressions.

Ok yeah, the movie was fantastic. It steps away from Miyazaki's typical High Fantasty element to show something really grounded in reality, telling the (loosely historical) story of Jiro Horikoshi's dream to build planes. Even though it takes place during the backdrop of WW 2, save for a few scenes, the war itself is never shown, almost exclusively focusing on Jiro's passion for building planes and the compromises he had to make since he was building war planes.

The romance in the story was probably the best Miyazaki has done in my honest opinion. It's short, but you really do get a feel for why the two characters fell in love.

If this is really Miyazaki's final film, then The Wind Rises is definitely his Swan Song.

I just got back from seeing it with my dad.

Gotta say, it was quite an amazing film. I'd liken it, believe it or not, to The Deer Hunter, in that it is what Quentin Tarantino coined, an "intimate epic". What I mean is that this film is indeed epic in terms of scope, themes, and visuals, but it's very slow paced and intimate. Like Deer Hunter, The Wind Rises isn't about big battle sequences. It's about two people simply having a conversation, or designing new creations, or falling in love not through extraordinary means, but through simple interactions with each other. Not to mention that it is also very quiet, with long stretches without dialogue, instead being content to let the animation and music tell the story. I really appreciate that, especially in an age where animated films seem to need the characters to gab every chance they have.

So yeah, I really loved it. My dad liked it too, though he did have problems with the ending. He felt that Naoko was wrong in choosing to live Jiro to die alone, and that she should have stayed by his side during her last moments. Her leaving because she wanted to spare him the pain of seeing her die didn't feel noble to him.

That aside, it was a great film.

I've narrowed it down. I can either go see this movie tonight, or go get a burger from Five Guys. Unfortunately, it's a one or the other deal, because Five Guys is an hours travel by public transportation. I don't know what to doooooooooooooo!!!!!...

Five Guys burgers are meh. Their fries are like crack though.

Funny, because I've never really liked their fries, but find the burgers absolutely divine. I know I'm in the minority about the fries though.

edited 1st Mar '14 3:49:30 PM by CDRW

So I went and saw it. It was good, I suppose, but my instinct that it wasn't the type of movie I'd like turned out to be true.

Why do we have two threads for this topic? That ain't right.

Having seen the superior Japanese Sub (cause as we all know, all subs are superior) a few months ago. The film is gorgeously animated, as to be expected from Ghibli, and the music and characters designs are fantastic. The plots was....decent. I enjoyed it as a film, but I never got into the more "Magical Realism" aspects of it- particularly the ending. I still enjoyed it more than Frozen.

edited 2nd Mar '14 11:26:17 AM by Mattonymy

Because I couldn't find it and figured that nobody had made one yet.

And.....the forum search bar was broken?

Not that I'm complaining. Just seems a tad superfluous to reboot something that only came out a few months ago.

Yes. The forum search bar was broken. It didn't work at all. It was so broken that I kept getting re-directed to Australia. It saved me a ton on travel costs, so that was nice, but it still wouldn't cough up a link to the thread that you just linked. Sorry for being superfluous.

The English Dub has Joseph Gordon Levitt so any Sub Vs Dub debate is irrelevant.

Indeed, he is one of my favorite actors.

Though, the original Japanese dub has Hideaki Anno, so there's that.

That bastard ran out of ink though.

Eh, animation is meant to be watched, not read. I'm fine with subs if I have to use them, but a foreign language just means it's harder to tell the difference between bad and good.

But the movie sure as Hell made up for it.

edited 2nd Mar '14 8:05:16 PM by TheAirman

@CDRW Oh, well when you put it like that then it makes PERFECT sense.

btw, since everyone seems to be migrating to here, requested a thread lock on the older one.

This is false. A foreign language might make it harder to judge the quality, maybe a lot harder for some people, but it certainly isn't impossible.

Okay, strictly can't may be an exaggeration; I'll go edit that. Still, the point I was getting at is that the notion of either being inherently superior or inferior is nonsense.

edited 2nd Mar '14 7:50:57 PM by TheAirman

So I just got back from watching this (subbed) at the Alamo Drafthouse, which may be the only theatre in the states of Kansas and Missouri still showing this outside of St. Louis. Very classy place, but enough about that.

This is simply one of the most beautiful works of art I have ever experienced. Jiro's first dream, where he is piloting and then the plane falls apart and later when he talks with Caproni about how he cannot fly due to near-sightedness are very personally touching due to me having the exact same problem (and colorblindness) interfering with my dreams of flying and becoming an astronaut. I suppose all I can really say is: Hayoa Miyazaki, for all your creations, thank you and congratulations.

edited 23rd Mar '14 12:53:16 PM by TheAirman