The Boy and the Heron (2023)

 

Genre: Fantasy/ Adventure 

Time: 2 hours

Director: Hayao Miyazaki

Quick Summary: A young boy named Mahito yearning for his mother ventures into a world shared by the living and the dead. There, death comes to an end, and life finds a new beginning. 

I went through the entire film not understanding a single thing. 

It seems like every 5 minutes, the scene just moves on regardless of whether it has explained anything or if it is ready to move on. Even then it moves onto something that seems random and doesn't connect with the last scene, or even the rest of the film. Even though I was fully paying attention to everything, I felt like I was constantly missing information so much that I had no clue that a person the boy meets is a very important character that I cannot explain or I will spoil. But they're there for a good portion of the film so you'd think it would tell you explicitly at least. It's nothing for a surprise twist, you just have to guess who they are in the context of the story. 

I don't think I need to tell you but the animation was stunning as always with Studio Ghibli. I think that was what was keeping me awake for most of it. Absolutely gorgeous artwork, and so vibrant colours. For the world-building, it was so interesting to see everything and the world unfold in front of us. Shame the story is so disjointed and fragmented.

Something I really disliked was that you're given no time to connect with any of the characters, especially the main character. I don't know but he seemed to always know what was going on and he was just so wooden. He wouldn't really react to anything. Too cool for this world it seems. Along with this, it seems like all the characters personalities kept changing? At one point one turns around to suddenly hate the boy out of nowhere with no explanation, which adds to the overall confusion of this film.

Now, the man of the hour. Robert Patterson. Aside from the visuals, he kept this film alive. From his voice to how he delivered his lines, absolutely hilarious. He was the only funny one, to be honest. I'm not sure if that's down to the script, which was dreadful. 

It's such a shame about this film as usually, Studio Ghibli produces masterpieces, but this was a constant battle of Oh maybe it's going finally make sense and Oh never mind. It just felt like a mess, and it was incredibly difficult to make sense of anything. Also a personal gripe, the original title "How Do You Live" would have been much better.

3/10