Making “How Do You Live?” required co-founder and 82-year-old Miyazaki, who also founded the renowned anime studio Ghibli, to come out of retirement.
Japan animator first film in decade: It took years to complete, and the studio took the rare step of closely guarding plot details and providing little publicity.
The only indication of the plot came from a billboard depicting a hand-drawn bird-like monster with an eye hidden beneath its beak.
Eisaku Kimura, a university student, said, “It was a very Ghibli-esque movie,” after seeing the movie at a morning showing in the hip Shibuya neighbourhood.
Although I saw a lot of (Miyazaki) in the film, it was exciting, even if it wasn’t because it was his final work.
The 1937 novel with the same name served as the basis for the movie “How Do You Live?” but the studio had previously stated that the film would be completely different.
Following the passing of his mother, the youngster in the movie relocates to the country with his father.
He encounters a heron there, who flies him to an other reality where the truth of his mother’s demise eventually comes to light.
“Russian English Instructor Praises Miyazaki’s ‘Crazy Mixture’ in His Final Film”
Russian English instructor Valeriia Matveeva, 30, said, “It’s such a crazy mixture of all the Ghibli films I’ve seen before.”
“I think it’s the best of it, and I think it can be both magical and a little frightening at times. I wasn’t sure what to think of it because there was no promotion, but it was good.
With his fanciful representations of nature and technology as well as well-known characters like the lovable Totoro, Miyazaki has developed a cult following.
In 2003, he won an Oscar for best animated picture for “Spirited Away,” a movie about a girl who becomes lost in a mystical land and tries to find her parents, who have been transformed into pigs.
Miyazaki announced in 2013 that he will stop making full-length films because he could no longer keep up the frantic pace of his meticulous work style.
Four years later, his production company made an about-face and announced that he was coming out of retirement to make what would be “his final film, considering his age.”