For Goro Miyazaki, the summer ended on a bittersweet note. This 39-year-old filmmaker had the pleasure of seeing his first movie, the animated feature Gedo Senki, or Tales From Earthsea, blossom into the biggest hit of the summer in Japan, as it rose to the top spot and took in more than US$61.4 million by the end of last month.
But even his success brought inevitable reminders that he is, after all, the other Miyazaki. His Oscar-winning father, Hayao, regarded by many critics as the greatest director working in animation today, has earned much more with his own hits. Ursula K. Le Guin, author of the popular Earthsea novels, on which the new film was based, went out of her way to make the distinction on her Web site, calling the father “a genius of the same caliber as Kurosawa or Fellini.” She went on to complain about the liberties Goro and his new film took with her work.
“Of course a movie shouldn't try to follow a novel exactly — they're different arts, very different forms of narrative,” she wrote. “There may have to be massive changes. But it is reasonable to expect some fidelity to the characters and general story in a film named for and said to be based on books that have been in print for 40 years.”
PHOTO: NY TIMES NEWS SERVICE
So the younger Miyazaki can be forgiven a bit of weariness. “Sometimes I wish hadn't entered the same profession as my father,” he said, speaking through an interpreter during an interview at Studio Ghibli, headquarters of Hayao Miyazaki and the director Isao Takahata, in this suburb of Tokyo. “I realized for the first time how difficult it is to be the son of Hayao Miyazaki. If I weren't involved in animated filmmaking, I would just have a simple, quiet, normal life.”
The film received an enthusiastic response at the Venice Film Festival this summer and is set for an eagerly anticipated European release in 2007.
Miyazaki based Gedo Senki primarily on The Farthest Shore, the third book in Guin's series, in which Ged, the Archmage, and Arren, Prince of Enlad, must defeat an evil sorcerer whose efforts to cheat death are destroying the balance that governs the realm of Earthsea. But Miyazaki added elements from the other novels and changed some aspects of the story. In the opening of the film, the darkness falling over the world causes Arren to stab his father; his quest for an escape from his crime leads him to Ged and the eventual confrontation with the sorcerer.
As a teenager Miyazaki read the Earthsea books, and he originally planned to make a faithful interpretation. “But as I continued on the project, I realized that adapting the story exactly was not really what I should do,” he said. “In order for me to speak to younger audiences, some changes had to be made because of the gap between when the book was written and when I made the film. I feel that metropolitan culture is becoming a dead end and there's nowhere to go. I can't just shout, ‘Return to nature,’ but we need to rethink how we can live in cities yet remain close to nature.”
Le Guin offered a balanced response, saying: “I thought the moral lectures in the film were spoken eloquently. In fact they were often quoted pretty directly from the books. But I didn't see how the action of the film justified them. They felt pasted on to me. I did not understand why Arren stabs his father, nor how and why he earned redemption.”
“I get roundly scolded on my Web site by younger Japanese people for not understanding the movie. These people don't know the books, so they're not confused, as I was.”
Toshio Suzuki, Studio Ghibli's president, acknowledged that the film had drawn some unfavorable responses. “The reactions from some animation fans have been very negative,” he said. “They compare Goro's work and his father's, just as fans of the novels complain that the film is different from the books. I discovered that many fans of Hayao Miyazaki cannot accept anything else.”
The younger Miyazaki said it was Suzuki who initially persuaded him to take the considerable risk of following in his father's footsteps.
“I had never thought about becoming an animation director,” he said. “I was deceived by Suzuki, who was very clever about making me feel I could do it.”
A slim, soft-spoken man, the younger Miyazaki has not yet said whether he will direct another animated feature, though his father and Takahata, the principal directors at Studio Ghibli, have been looking for younger directors for years, saying the organization needs new blood.
Just after 6am, I walked up to the ticket gate at Taipei Main Station and entered the Taiwan Railway platform without scanning any ticket; instead, I flashed the Sanrio Fun Rail pass on my phone to the gate worker and was admitted. I found my train and prepared to board. My destination? This very same station. I was embarking on a 13-hour journey on one of two round-the-island trains operated by ezTravel. They run each day, one counterclockwise around the island and one clockwise. They differ in a number of ways from an ordinary Taiwan Railway train and can make for
Jason Han says that the e-arrival card spat between South Korea and Taiwan shows that Seoul is signaling adherence to its “one-China” policy, while Taiwan’s response reflects a reciprocal approach. “Attempts to alter the diplomatic status quo often lead to tit-for-tat responses,” the analyst on international affairs tells the Taipei Times, adding that Taiwan may become more cautious in its dealings with South Korea going forward. Taipei has called on Seoul to correct its electronic entry system, which currently lists Taiwan as “China (Taiwan),” warning that reciprocal measures may follow if the wording is not changed before March 31. As of yesterday,
The Portuguese never established a presence on Taiwan, but they must have traded with the indigenous people because later traders reported that the locals referred to parts of deer using Portuguese words. What goods might the Portuguese have offered their indigenous trade partners? Among them must have been slaves, for the Portuguese dealt slaves across Asia. Though we often speak of “Portuguese” ships, imagining them as picturesque vessels manned by pointy-bearded Iberians, in Asia Portuguese shipping between local destinations was crewed by Asian seamen, with a handful of white or Eurasian officers. “Even the great carracks of 1,000-2,000 tons which plied
On Thursday, former Taipei mayor and founder of the Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) Ko Wen-je (柯文哲) was sentenced to 17 years in prison and had his civil rights suspended for six years over corruption, embezzlement and other charges. Seven others related to the case were also handed prison sentences, while two were found not guilty. It has been a bad week for the TPP. On Tuesday, prosecutors charged Chinese immigrant Xu Chunying (徐春鶯) with suspicion of taking part in Beijing-directed election interference. Xu has strong links to the TPP, which once offered her a party list legislator nomination. Tuesday also
RSS