Searching for Hayao Miyazaki’s wisdom in a disappointing end to his groundbreaking career.

By Belén Haberman – 6th grade.

Swept into a fantasy world by a talking heron, 12 year old Mahito is told that the mother he lost in a hospital fire is still alive. Here, an extraordinary but somewhat confusing spiritual journey begins. Mahito is first confronted by a pirate who lives in the world of the dead. He is surrounded by spirits that resemble children and who also happen to be food for pelicans. Mahito then finds his mother as a child when she saves him from a gang of enormous hungry parakeets. In the meantime, he realizes that his aunt is his new maternal figure. Towards the end, Mahito’s great-grand-uncle, the wizard of stars, emerges from a windy field and balances blocks to determine the future of the world. Mahito is asked if he will carry on this important task. He refuses and decides to return to reality with a new understanding of his mother’s death. 

I was very excited to go to the theaters to see the work of my favorite director of animation Hayao Miyazaki. As the lights dimmed and the smell of popcorn flooded the air, the big screen brightened and I was plunged into a strange world of imagination. After seeing the two hour long film I was dazed and confused about the plot, unable to comprehend the moral of the story. I couldn’t believe that the same brilliant artist who created My Neighbor Totoro and The Wind Rises could have come up with such a perplexing and mediocre narrative. 

You may have heard from other viewers that this film is filled with metaphors of grief and loss, and it is, however the incomprehensible plot makes it very difficult to grasp these themes. In many of Miyazaki’s films, he intertwines his own experiences during difficult times in his life and reveals these hardships through his characters. The way Hayao Miyazaki wrote the screenplay of The Boy and The Heron is more of a dreamscape than a story, jumping from one scene to another without linking any of the important details together. The Boy and The Heron is much like a kaleidoscope, many breath-taking drawings and ideas but all mixed up to create one giant mess. 

In Miyazaki’s other works, intricately but simply woven plots are one of the key factors to why they are some of his best films. Unfortunately this did not take place in the Boy and the Heron because of the long, drawn out story line that didn’t connect at all with the audience. Miyazaki’s other work proves that he has the capacity to create movies that relate to the viewer. For example, in Kiki’s Delivery Service, Kiki, a young witch, has to travel the world on her own to find a city she can live and find her purpose in. This relates to adolescents when they experience big changes in their lives as they grow into adults. 

Similarly, in Spirited Away, Chihiro has to navigate through a perilous spirit world in order to save her parents. Miyazaki is able to take his young protagonist through tests and turns, and with careful, captivating storytelling, makes it worth going through that journey with her. Shizuku, in Whisper of the Heart, relates to young women motivated to prove themselves in a competitive world all while being a heartwarming love story. In contrast, I couldn’t find any connection between me and The Boy and the Heron’s Mahito. It was very difficult to have any sympathy for him. As the viewer, it is impossible to relate with Mahito’s overwhelming grief, because of the overpowering fantasy world that Miyazaki plunges him and the audience in. As the tears fell from Mahito’s eyes when he leafs through the book his mother left him, Miyazaki did not allow me to cope with the feelings of sympathy I had for the boy, as I was too distracted by what felt like unnecessary and disorienting adventures that followed. 

Unlike the symbolic hero’s journey found in the stories of Kiki, Shizuku, or Satsuki, The Boy and the Heron doesn’t deliver the same satisfying conclusion that makes the viewer pleased and excited, producing a very disappointing end to his extraordinary career. 

…Or is it really the end?