Ponyo on the Cliff by the Sea

Ponyo is essentially a Miyazaki take on Walt Disney's Little Mermaid. That's not to say it is the only influence, but the two stories are very similar. This is by no means a bad thing. As always, Miyazaki creates a believable world along with a movie consisting of the largest number of individual hand drawn slides the studio has done to date, but also a project where Miyazaki himself spent time to draw most of the waves and water. This all comes together for a movie. Ponyo received the Japanese academy award for years best animated film when it released.

Ponyo is a little goldfish who is the eldest of all her sisters. She has been living with her overprotective and somewhat eccentric magician father. While they are out one day, Ponyo finds a chance to escape and see the world. As she travels, she soon becomes swept up in a passing by ship's net and becomes stuck in a jar. Sosuke releases her and quickly the two become friends as she sits in a pail of water and he feeds her ham on the way to kindergarten.



As I've had to clear up for a few of my doubting friends, Ponyo is not a bad movie, it just isn't in the same caliber of Princess Mononoke or Spirited Away. For me, the amazingness was not particularly in the story or the world created, but in the art and how amazing it was that Miyazaki was intimately involved in drawing most of the waves and water scenes. It is also maybe notable that there is not a spec of CG in this entire movie. For gamers, this is the ODST of the Halo series. Still really cool and fun to play through, but overall a little shorter than the other games and not quite ridiculous by itself. You can't say it's bad by any means, just not quite as engaging as other Miyazaki films. As might be expected, soundtracks and visual art are notch on, the Japanese dub is a little better in my opinion, but the English version does fine.
There is a very real sense of home in this movie. I can't quite put my finger on it, but there are definitely aspects that strongly remind me of parallel, or similar experiences in my childhood. I wish I was still able to make such clear sense of the world as the characters in this movie.