天空の城ラピュタ (Tenkū no Shiro Rapyuta)
9/10 — A classic for a reason.

Castle in the Sky is without a doubt one of the more well-known anime. While many series and movies come and go like passing fads, young kids in Japan today still know Laputa, and so do their parents. The reason for this is the many talented Hayao Miyazaki and Studio Ghibli. This movie originally came out the year I was born, and I am very happy to have the opportunity to watch it and bring the review to you now. I do feel it is a timeless classic that is suited to a wide variety of audiences.

First the basics:

Voice Acting: 9/10 — a diversity of characters with distinct personalities
(This pertains to the American Disney cast.)
The voice acting in the movie is quite exceptional. There are a number of big names, such as Mandy Patinkin, Mark Hamill, James Van Der Beek, Anna Paquin, and Andy Dick, among others. They deliver an exceptional performance in spite of occasionally awkward dialogue. They make the moments where you kinda wonder why the character said that seem much more natural than other voice actors would, and it makes it that much easier to slip into the realm of the story. Now, the characters do sound awfully stereotypical throughout, from Dola the boisterous pirate mother to Muska, who always sounds evil and sinister even when he’s faking being genuine in order to be persuasive. Pazu and Sheeta are less cliched, which is nice, but there are points where you start to like the secondary characters and they don’t always come through as unique.

Animation: 9/10 — Beautiful scenery and smooth, clear character action.
The backgrounds for this movie are amazingly well-painted; they’re simply beautiful. And while some people don’t particularly care for the Ghibli style of animation that is so recognizable in their films, it is still done very professionally. The actions are clear and recognizable — even some of the more complicated events in the movie you can readily discern what is occurring. The art aptly conveys what’s going on and the choices in camera angles and scene changes are also handled extraordinarily well. We get a lot of playing with distances and layering of various foregrounds with a number of things going on in the background — there’re no audiences of people standing still while things happen at the forefront. It really is about as good as it gets, and it sucks you right into the plot.

Music/Sound Effects: 10/10 — Exceptional.
Joe Hisaishi, a regular composer for Ghibli and also “Beat” Takeshi, is responsible for the music in Laputa. His style has that epic fantasy story feel, which is very appropriate for this film. There are moments that jog my memory of old Final Fantasy games and Chrono Trigger. Given the story, I think Hisaishi’s style fits right in, and it brings emotional emphasis to many of the scenes. There are also a variety of sound effects that play key roles in the action of Castle in the Sky. Everything from steam engines, to the organic sounds in the Laputian garden, to the many many explosions and gun battles — it’s all handled masterfully, and never do you think that either a sound has gone missing or feels misplaced with what’s going on; rather, the world is more fully fleshed out by the circumambient noises that’re included.

Story/Script: 8/10 — An epic tale, especially in the original Japanese
The Japanese script for the film is quite good; although, a little dated. The American rewrite for the dub is sort of crappy in that characters randomly use and dispose of information in jokes that they would not be privy to, and some of the line changes dumb down the original script and story. I for one think there’s a number of extra interesting details to Sheeta’s backstory that she reveals that get trimmed out of the American version. It is unfortunate. Still, the story is magnificent; it has a moral buried deep enough that you can recognize it, but it doesn’t get in the way; and it’s simply an enjoyable story to follow. You want to know what happens next, and I think that says a lot about the quality of the writing. Also, in spite of some changes in the English script, the dialogue is actually quite good, and the characters tend to come off as pretty natural, rather than forced or substituting for a narrator, etc.

The Technicals:
Produced by Isao Takahata and Studio Ghibli, and written and directed, of course, by Hayao Miyazaki. It was originally released on April 2nd, 1986, and has an approx. runtime of 126 minutes. It was also the first film created and released by Studio Ghibli.

Summary:
So the movie starts with a young girl, Sheeta, on an airship being attacked by a group of air pirates known as the Dola gang/clan.

It quickly becomes apparent that she is there against her will, and she uses the opportunity of the pirate attack to try and escape. And anyone who’s watched this movie that it was pretty sweet when the girl brained the government-looking official with a wine bottle. I know that’s when I fell in love with Sheeta, anyway. Castle in the Sky is often compared to Disney films, but show me where Dumbo takes matters so capably into his own trunk — I think the bravery already displayed by Sheeta is way more impressive and admirable than the more general morals displayed in Disney films.

However, Sheeta ends up falling off the airship, and is miraculously saved by the power of a crystal, which is clearly what the pirates were after. She falls down to earth, where a boy named Pazu catches her as she slowly descends towards the mine where he is working.

Pazu has to get back to work, but he takes Sheeta home with him — he’s looking after her, do you remember people ever being this good natured? That’s what I thought. No awkward moments while she’s asleep ensue — thank God this wasn’t a Shonen Jump manga first because you KNOW that he would of groped her by mistake or something. The next morning she wakes up to him blowing his horn — literally plays a trumpet atop his house for God knows what reason. And they have some cutesy conversation getting to know one another, while he explains to her what happened. So, in the dub there’s a line that comes out “if my head were any harder it’d be a cannonball” but in the Japanese it’s definitely closer to “my head is harder than the boss’s fists.” Oh how times change! This conversation comes about because Pazu thinks he knows how the crystal works, puts it on, and jumps off his house, only to crash down through the brick roof of the lower story. At least he had something to hit, he does live overlooking a giant canyon. We also find out that Pazu’s father once took a picture of Laputa, but no one believed it was real. A literary reference is cut from the American script here — for shame! — as Laputa is from Gulliver’s Travels by Swift, and Pazu mentions it in the Japanese.

Of course, the pirates come looking for Sheeta and the crystal, and somehow they end up at Pazu’s place rather fast. Sheeta and Pazu make a break for it with some of the town’s people helping out, only to run into the military and the government official, Colonel Muska, who Sheeta conked out with the wine bottle. Now, there’s a battle between the pirates and the military as they both try to capture Sheeta and Pazu, who are desperately trying to make their escape aided by the townspeople (take a deeeeeep breath).

In the chase, Pazu and Sheeta fall into the canyon and are saved by the crystal. Deep in an old mine Sheeta tells Pazu about her homeland, Gondoa, far to the north. Both her parents had died, and she worked the farm alone. Now, we notice a sort of common trend with characters. Sheeta was a hard-working farmgirl (doing a job that actually she probably couldn’t have done on her own, but we can overlook that, I suppose), and Pazu is a miner from a mining town.

Sheeta was abducted from her farm by Colonel Muska and his associates. Wandering around in the old mine, they run into Uncle Pom, who is crazy.

I burst out laughing when Uncle Pom said he doesn’t get lonely traversing the mines alone because the rocks talk to him. Of course, the story validates him because all the rocks glow in a sort of way. Apparently glowing means speaking. Uncle Pom would go deaf in Vegas. Uncle Pom, upon seeing Sheeta’s crystal, warns them that misuse of such power will only bring misery, and the crystal should remind us all that we come from the earth and it is to the earth that we will return — very heavy-handed, and it seems a little random; the ominous foreshadowing is a bit overdone, and while the moral message is clear, I’m not sure how you quite get that out of glowy, powerful crystal, ooh-aah. For some reason the Japanese call the crystal something like Volucite, and the American version is Aetherium (it’s probably wordplay in the Japanese similar to that in the American, I just don’t get it, ah well).

Once out of the cave, the pair is immediately cornered by the military, captured and brought to the military’s island of doom!

Therein, Pazu is tossed into an oubliette-like spot, and Sheeta is taken to a normal bedchamber. Apparently the national past time has become hauling around unconscious little girls. A strange bit of translation goes on here too: in the American script Muska lies and tells Sheeta that Pazu is being treated very well, and in the Japanese he tells her not to worry because Pazu is more stubborn than he is. Also, the second omitted literary reference is here. In the Japanese, Muska asks, sarcastically, if Sheeta thinks that Laputa is like Treasure Island — for shame! why cut so many lit references? Makes me sad. And Muska shows Sheeta a mechanical soldier that fell from Laputa, and seems to be the reason the government has taken such a strong interest in what was, until recently, considered a myth.

We shortly find out that Sheeta is the true heir to the throne of the kingdom of Laputa, and in order to save Pazu she agrees to help the military. She then gets weepy because Pazu was such a cutie, and she let him get away. Also Pazu tries to scale the wall of his prison to no avail, but he still scales halfway up the damn wall! What is this? Uncharted?!

When Pazu gets home the pirates are waiting for him, but after a heart to heart with the mother of the pirates and their leader/captain/etc., Pazu teams up with them to try and save Sheeta (the pirates of course are still after the crystal).

Meanwhile, Sheeta remembers the words to awaken the crystal from when she was young, and this in turn brings the giant robot man back to life. Chaos ensues. The military thinks they’ve killed the robot, and this happens:

The military is continuing to try to destroy the robot just as the pirates show up.

They manage to rescue Sheeta, but not the crystal. The crystal is mysteriously left on, so to speak, pointing the way to Laputa.

Pazu and Sheeta join up with the pirates as members of the crew. Pazu becomes the engineer’s, Pops, assistant, and Sheeta becomes the cleaning lady/cook.

Many of the pirates become attracted to Sheeta because she starts wearing Mom’s old clothes; though, the age difference is somewhat disturbing, it’s more funny than creepy. The pirates, of course, are also heading for Laputa.

Pazu and Sheeta manage to spend some time together when it’s Pazu’s turn to go on watch; they share a cloak; it’s cute. Sheeta confesses her feelings about not wanting to actually find Laputa because of the dangers: the bit here is a bit better fleshed out in Japanese, as in the writing is more thought out and convincing than the dumbed down version that Disney created in their English dub. Both Dola and the pirates overhear this conversation. Of course Dola thinks it’s sweet, and the pirates are grief stricken because it’s obvious Sheeta only has eyes for Pazu. The conversations comes to an abrupt halt when Pazu and Sheeta realize they’ve caught up with the military’s air destroyer, Goliath, and are flying above it.

The pirates manage to escape the Goliath in the cloud cover, but they have to follow it in order to track it to Laputa. Sheeta and Pazu go up in a glider attached to the pirate’s airship to keep watch. They see a massive cloud coming up ahead, which appears to be a hurricane.

It sucks them in and detaches the glider that Sheeta and Pazu are on, but Pazu is fairly certain that inside the giant cloud lies Laputa.

They manage to get through the storm and discover an amazing garden with robot remaining to tend it; all the others have broken down over the years. Various animals roam the area.

Then there’s an explosion, and it becomes apparent that the Goliath and its crew of several hundred soldiers has managed to land on Laputa as well. Sheeta and Pazu investigate and realize that the pirates have survived, but were taken prisoner.

Meanwhile, the army begins to loot the city, and Muska heads off on his own, looking for something else.

He captures Sheeta, but Pazu gets away. Pazu frees the pirates, and Muska finds what he was looking for — the heart of Laputa. It turns out Muska is also of noble blood from the kingdom of Laputa.
According to him Laputa has been without a king for 700 years, and Laputa is the source of several ancient myths: in Hinduism, Ramayana’s arrow, and in the Christian/Jewish Old Testament, the fire from Heaven that destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah. Muska then proclaims his sovereignty and uses the power of Laputa to kill most of the military present.

And awakens a ton of extra robot dudes. Pazu has managed to cling to the underside of Laputa this whole time and finally gets back in to find his way to Sheeta.

Meanwhile, Sheeta has managed to take the crystal from Muska and is hectically trying to escape. She gets the crystal to Pazu through a crack in the wall, and Muska chases her into the throne room, where he proceeds to shoot off her pigtails — I know, WTF?! Pazu arrives and bargains the stone in exchange for a chance to talk with Sheeta. Muska of course is an idiot and says ok, I can’t possibly see any harm in letting you speak to the girl who can apparently cast spells. And then they cast the spell of destruction because Pazu has the stone.

Oddly enough, the spell to activate the stone was some four obscure sounding words, and the spell of destruction is hardly even a syllable. Muska randomly goes blind, the kids appear dead, and just like every Indiana Jones movie, the legendary structure that has gone on for hundreds to thousands of years a-okay collapses into itty bitty rock bits.

Even though the technology center of Laputa is destroyed, the roots of the giant tree at the center of the city catch the giant crystal that was holding the city aloft, and Laputa takes off!

And NO, Sheeta and Pazu aren’t dead. They find the glider they came in on and glide down to the pirates. In a hilarious moment of characters knowing things they could have no way of knowing (which happens a lot, especially in the English dub; this error for instance, doesn’t happen in the Japanese), Dola comments to Sheeta that there’s nothing worse than having your pigtails shot off. The pirates actually managed to secure a good deal of treasure, and Sheeta and Pazu glide off together. The End.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mazda_Laputa

Roughly translated as the “Mazda Whore”

Just back from the con this evening. And I feel like this:

And aside from totally throwing me off in every way, I find DST really exciting. If everything else fails, let the twice-a-year time-change exhilarate your life… I always have a hard time wrapping my head around the logic of DST. All the leaping forward and falling back and gaining hours and losing hours and the great extra sunshine in those god-forbidden hours no decent person should be doomed to witness. I was sort of paranoid that none of the clocks were going to change automatically, and I was going to sleep in too much and miss the early AM panels [at the con]. The hotel clock wasn’t automatic, but my phone didn’t fail totally, and at 2 AM when I checked the time it had performed its duty, and no panels were missed. No, rather, I woke up 1.30 hrs before the alarm went off. Now I feel like a Laputacian robot that needs some axle grease, requiring a very sturdy spatula to peel my crippled and still breathing carcass off the pocky-crumb dusted floor… 

The only thing I really missed this weekend was the music. Follow up from earlier post: con #1 of con: super extra no Jrock at the dance this year. Plus it started late and finished early, but what’s a chap to do, eh? Right before they played the last song, they said something about because it was an anime convention, needing to end it with certain style, so they played a high-energy meow-meow candy-pop song. If they were really worried about that, they should have played Jpop the whole (or even a 1/3) the way through. No, I’m not ‘con’plaining. Also, the dubious “Intro to Jrock” panel was removed from the events-list this year, much to my relief.

Hey-ho. Tomorrow is brutal re-entry to the cold and disinterested 9-5. Life can’t be all fun and anime, right? Wrong.

Week from Monday is London, and then scraping together any scant remaining quid to buy Double Decker boots. Day in the life of GP, your eternal host on Secret Garden, over and out. +

Well twin I’m not going to let your lackadaisical reading schedule impede my Gulliverian progress…I will continue to read this book Swiftly! (Zing!)

Part of the reason that I won’t let you get in my way is that I’m excited to see what happens in these unknown islands of part three…coming into the novel I knew that Lilliput had the little people and that Brobdingnag had the big people and that Houyhnhms was unpronounceable, but meanwhile part three remained a delightful mystery (the only thing that could have made this mystery more delightful, I daresay, are cat sleuths).

Well mystery no more…just call me Pandora and look at my big, open box! But instead of ills this box I’ve opened is a box of wonders (not so very different from a Whitman’s Sampler–I love candy.). Why Laputa is a floating island! (Spoiler: Laputa floats). And the Laputians, sure they’re not the prettiest (or the smartest), but I’m simply delighted by their sideways heads and lolling eyes.

And that’s all the farther I’ve gotten. This book’s long sentences take concentration and lately my bus has been chatty and it’s hard to focus with all of these conversations going on. The only mystery (not delightful…nary a cat sleuth in sight) is why no one wants to talk to the friendly gentleman reading Gulliver’s Travels?

I’ll let you ponder that one as you continue your Travels,
Jon

Il Bento Miyazakiano. Per tutti i gusti. Gnam, gnam.

Silent On-Looker:
YouTube
zShare Download

Bom, como alguns já saem, eu não coloquei o “Our Solemn Hour” no YouTube porque ele reclamou de copyright… então, fiz outra versão, com uma música bem mais obscura, para que eu pudesse colocar no meu canal no YouTube.

Dessa vez, eu quis diminuir o número de efeitos drasticamente, pois eu li comentários no NicoNico de que o vídeo era muito pesado e com efeitos random, sem sentido… e eu tive que concordar XD

Apesar dos efeitos serem legais, eu não dei um “significado” para eles, então em certos momentos eu mesmo vi que parecia mais um show de efeitos do Corel do que uma edição decente. Eu precisava mudar isso.

Passei a trabalhar com efeitos e transições mais básicas, e aprendi a mexer um pouco mais nos “layers”, criando alguns efeitos por conta própria, derivados dos efeitos básicos, ao invés de me limitar aos que o Corel tem.

Levou um tempinho para achar uma música que eu gostasse e que também combinasse com a minha idéia, tinha que ter um vocal variando entre o lado mais “melódico” (nem sei se é essa a palavra correta) e um mais agressivo, assim como os instrumentos.

Acabei indo procurar no meio dos meus cds (sim, eu tenho cds originais ‘-’) J-Pop/J-Rock, e finalmente encontrei uma música que se encaixava no perfil: Laputa – Silent On-Looker (vai, pode rir do nome da banda… XD)

A partir daí, foram mais algumas horas dividindo a música, encaixando os vídeos, calculando as transições… no fim, o resultado foi o esperado: um vídeo mais leve, com o mesmo conteúdo e que eu posso colocar no YouTube sem a WMG me perseguir XD

Consegui comprimir bem mais o vídeo também: com os codecs atualizados e fuçando o ffdshow por um tempo, cheguei numa configuração aceitável. A versão do YouTube ficou com cerca de 45MB, enquanto a versão download tem 62MB. Bem melhor que os quase 150MB da versão anterior!

Agradecimentos especiais:

- Vinny-Hunter: dono do blog Momentary Life, com muito conteúdo de Guilty Gear, e que ajudou muito a divulgar o vídeo “Our Solemn Hour” ^_^

- Landstalker: dono do blog Sasuga Buchou!!, com opiniões sobre animes, mangás e etc. Ele deu uma força na parte do encoding desse vídeo, e algumas idéias do que não fazer nele também XD

- Guilty Gear BR: melhor comunidade de Guilty Gear que conheço. E tenho dito!

Una de las cosas que más le insisto a mis clientes cuando van a lanzar una nueva empresa o un producto, es en la elección correcta del nombre. El consumidor es muy dado a elegir cosas porque “se oyen bien” o porque le remiten a algo conocido, pero sin ser demasiado evidentes, es decir, a una papelería no necesariamente podemos ponerle “La goma”, existen como 10,000 homónimas y la competencia es dura. Para ello, lo mejor es recurrir a expertos en branding, que ofrezcan opciones varias sobre el proyecto y elegir el nombre, no por capricho o gusto personal, sino por fundamento en cifras o datos duros. El problema más grande al que nos enfrentamos, decidido esto, es a lo que podría significar ése nombre en otras partes del mundo. Esto es algo que no analizan muchas empresas, pero que es importantísimo, o si no me creen, vean estos ejemplos nefastos de empresas y productos orientales:

Como dato curioso, les digo que a la Volkswagen, el no investigar de estos asuntos antes de lanzar uno de sus productos, le costó millones. En todo el mundo, tienen un automóvil que se llama FOX, excepto en México que le pusieron Polo debido a que su lanzamiento fue hecho cuando estaba en el poder ejecutivo, el presidente Vicente Fox, por lo que no quería la marca que fuera asociada con asuntos de gobierno, e hizo bien, pero pudieron habérselo ahorrado.

Otro caso interesante es el del cantante de reggaetón Nigga, que en Estados Unidos tiene otro nombre, se llama Flex, porque Nigga es un mote ofensivo para los negros, cosa que le podría haber causado no sólo rechazo, sino incluso amenazas a su integridad física. ¿Qué necesidad? Si se hubiera puesto Flex aquí en México, no hubiera habido ningún problema, de todos modos, como músico, es malo.

I was in this beautiful garden yesterday, and it was then I came to think about Laputa Castle In The Sky. I saw it some years ago, and I remember a large garden of some kind.

Bento from the first week of school, term 2.

Monday’s bento: bed of rice with inari robot from the Laputa movie, surrounded by carrot and cucumber flowers.

Friday’s bento: “Mr and Mrs Penguin”. Rice onigiri with nori faces and carrot feet, mouth, star and bowti surrounded by fancy lettuce.

Today was the day that I had set aside to make a trip out to the neighbour hood of Mitaka (about 20 minutes away from Shinjuku by Train), home of the Ghibli Museum.

The museum is about a kilometre from the Mitaka station, which makes a rather nice walk, as the path is boarded by reserve. Totoro marks the way, and is also ready to take tickets once you arrive.

If only Totoro could take the tickets… Tickets to the museum are via a pre-booking, which can be done through travel agents, or through Lawson stores (similar to a 711 or IGA in Australia). Once you present your booking confirmation, they will give to a ticket for entry, which also allows you to watch a session of a Ghibli short film within the museum. The entry tickets consist of frames of film from Ghibli movies, such as Kiki’s Delivery Service, as seen in mine.

Mitaka is quite a pleasant part of Tokyo, whilst still hectic, it is a much more calmer experience compared to Akihabara or Shinjuku.

On the roof of the museum they have built a rather nice garden area, with a life size robot from Laputa. At the very bottom of the open, outside area they have installed this fountain, which everyone seemed infatuated with, but I am a little confused about its significance.

Soot spites make an appearance throughout the museum:

Due to a need to maintain interest in visitors travelling to the museum, they do not allow photography of the inside displays, which is why I don’t have any. Regardless, I was very impressed. They have a display dedicated to the craft of creating animation, including a device using spinning figures and strobe lighting, which was perfectly timed to give the allusion that the figures were running, flying, skipping etc. There were also large displays for Ponyo, an almost life-size cat bus for kids to climb on and even a display dedicated to Wallace and Gromit! Overall it is a very innovative and enjoyable museum dedicated to the Ghibli films.

Anyways, I’m worn out, time for a rest. Looking forward to possibly heading out to Roppongi tomorrow.

When my friend’s co-worker was asked “What is your favorite Miyazaki movie?” He replied, “What? That’s like me picking a favorite noodle in a bowl of macaroni and cheese.”

That has to be the best analogy when describing the fantastic works of Hayao Miyazaki. I know when I am confronted with that question I tend to stutter and just blurt out a random Miyazaki film title. I do believe that Miyazaki is the Walt Disney of Japan.

Now that you can see how much I love Miyazaki and his works it is going to to be terribly difficult to find a flaw in his films. Laputa: Castle in the Sky or just Castle in the Sky was surprisingly a film I had not seen but it was one that I really wanted to see soon. I am probably going to watch it again tonight. Heeee…

The story is simple enough to sum up. Orphan Pazu lives in a small tight-knit mining town when a girl is literally thrust into his arms as she floats, with the aid of magical crystal, from the sky while trying to escape pirates and the army. Then Pazu and Sheeta, the girl, leave town to find Laputa by force not by choice with the government and pirates on their tails. They eventually find aid in the pirates led by a strong woman named Dola. Pazu and Sheeta become bonded on their search and eventual discovery of the floating island and that bond is put to the test inside the core of the island when the government captures her. Then with a destructive spell Pazu and Sheeta save themselves as the island floats far into the heavens.

I have to start off by saying the writing is lovely, as always. The script and the story just allow the film to gracefully trot at a wonderful pace. Alnd the characters shine bright with this writing. They grow and change as the film progresses but still are the same people we met at the beginning of the film.

Joe Hisaishi. I love love LOVE Hisaishi’s score. I am a film score junky in the first place. So, if Miyazaki is the Disney of Japan then Joe Hisaishi is the John Williams of Japan. It’s true!

Do I really have to mention the animation? I mean really… The details are astounding. Just as an example of the detail attention there was a point at which Pazu shoots out a wall at close range and I noticed that parts of the wall had ended up int the barrel of the gun and when he moves they tumble out. The deal is that you had to have been actually watching the gun to see it. Pazu was the main focus in the scene. Insanity.

I honestly cannot think of anything that I could say negative or critical about the film. You have to be a jerk to find something bad in Miyazaki films. You should go watch a Miyazaki film right now, it will brighten your day.

Thank you so much to Helen McCarthy for 500 Essential Anime Movies.

Genre: Animation/Adventure/Steampunk

Director: Hayao Miyazaki

Year: 1986 (English release in 2003)

Number of Times Seen: 8

Owned: Yes

Govt Rating: PG

DTA Rating: 9/10

Reasons for Loving/Hating: Absolutely beautiful work of art, compelling story, and overall magical experience as one would expect from this master of animation. The English voice cast was somewhat miscast, though.

_______________________________________________________________________________________

This was the one Studio Ghibli film that I was unable to watch before purchase (as my local video store didn’t have a single copy and I hadn’t yet acquired Netflix), a fact which tortured me for several years. I finally took it on faith that it would be worth the money and bought it. And it absolutely was. It quickly became one of my favorite Japanese imports, right up there with Pocky.

The story is typical Miyazaki-sensei: Two youngsters from different walks of life find themselves involved in an epic war and must save the world using magic. They sort of fall in love, but it’s ambiguous, as is the ending.

The art is absolutely top-notch even for the master, and the characters are immediately likable. I even liked the villain, Muska, just for his infinite creepiness.

The floating city of Laputa

The kids, Sheeta and Pazu, are uber cute and likable, though they do look like pretty much every main character ever done by Miyazaki-sensei (with the exception of Howl’s Moving Castle’s main characters, who are much older). But there’s that classic charm of innocence about them that works so beautifully.

The only objection I have to the characters has nothing to do with the art. It’s the English voice cast. Pazu is voiced by James Van Der Beek, best known as Dawson from Dawson’s Creek. And his voice doesn’t fit the character at all. It’s too gruff and deep for a kid.

Anna Paquin, who voiced Sheeta, on the other hand, really works, though I couldn’t help giggling every time I heard a little Rogue in her voice.

Sheeta and Pazu

The other super cool thing about this movie was the use of sky pirates. That’s right. Flying pirates. So totally awesome. So amazingly steampunk.

Anyways, I recommend it highly, and don’t want to spoil the plot by trying to outline it further. Just find a copy somewhere and watch it. I guarantee the best viewing experience you’ll have this year.

-DTA

Doodle 181 - Laputa Robot

This morning the boys wanted to watch a movie I couldn’t find so they settled on Castle in the Sky from Hayao Miyazaki.  This is one of the robots from the floating city.

I can’t seems to find a suitable solution to stream music yet, so this audio only youtube clip is probably the only alternative I manage to find. Bare with me on this one.

私が消える (romaji: watashi ga kie ru; translation: I disappear) is a song by one of my favourite band, Laputa, which I’d reviewed another song earlier. 私が消える is not exactly a great hit. Heck, I might as well go on the record to say that Laputa didn’t do many great songs in the interesting era of Visual-kei, which really explain their lack of success with a major label.

Great hit or not, I think 私が消える is nontheless an interesting piece, especially on its arrangement. Have a listen to it below. Pay special notice to the bass part 2 min 8 seconds into the song.

私が消える – Laputa

The bass playing at the noted part is really a far-cry from the bass virtuoso I blogged earlier. Nonetheless it is still noteworthy, as you need not to integrate out of the world trechniques or even overplaying to instill great texture and change the tempo to a piece of music.

Overall, the flavour of the song is also noteworthy as well, which sounded more like an operatic play than a J-Rock song. Interesting song.

君に口付けてしまった僕は
全て脱ぎ捨てて　さらけ出すでしょう
築き上げて来た物は無い
君は一人しか居ないから

寒い　凍えてしまう　誰も信じられない
そう　孤独でいい　そう　願うなら
そして　何も出来ない僕は　ここから消える
そう　美しく　そう　願うから

僕を傷付けてしまった君は
何も気付かずに　笑ってるでしょう
創り上げて来た物は崩れ
僕の代わりなら何処にでも

※風に誘われるまま　今を感じていたい
そう　独りでいい　そう　叶うなら
そして　がんじがらめの僕の震えが止まる
そう　夢でもいい　そう　叶うから※

硝子越しに君をただ　見つめていれば　壊さずに
硝子張りの君はもう　壊さずには居られなくて

寒い　凍えてしまう　誰も信じられない
Please Please Please integrate, Freeze Freeze Freeze my cloud
そして　何も出来ない僕は　ここから消える
Please Please Please brandnew back, Freeze Freeze Freeze my sad

(※くり返し)

硝子越しに君をただ　見つめていれば　壊さずに
硝子張りの君はもう　壊さずには居られなくて

Lyrics taken from jpopasia

Personal Take:

Laputa was a visual rock band from Nagoya, Japan. The band was mainly active in the Japanese Rock scene in the mid-90s, and finally ceased all activities in 2004 (mainly due to the disappointing sales of the later albums with Nippon Crown). Although it was not a highly notable band even at its peak, Laputa still managed to release 6 top 30 singles (Oricon Chart), with memorable songs like meet again, feelin’ the sky and Virgin Cry.

To me, Laputa is J-Rock 101. It was one of the first band that struck a deep impression in me, before I was acquainted with a bass guitar. Not too heavy and a little mainstream, Laputa got me excited about the japanese rock scene, allowing me to follow other bands and musical variations within the genre. It also did a wonderful job, teaching me through their music about the distinctive flavour in J-Rock, as compared to western rock.

If anyone were to ask me what is so unique about J-Rock, I would definitely refer them to 硝子の肖像 (romaji: Garasu no Shouzou; translation: Glass Portrait) by Laputa. It is one of the acceptably loud, and yet not obscene enough or irritating enough for most listeners. Yet it retains the elements which are quite unique to rock in Japan.

- Abstraction in lyrics – using an object or phenomenon to talk about personal turmoils or meaning of existence. In this case, a glass portrait is being depicted as a lover who have just turn cold, leaving the person totally helpless.

- 4/4 beat

- Wild bass-lines. Bass in this era tend to overplay with imaginative bass lines, mainly to emphasis phrases in the song. Noteworthy that many if not all of the bass players in J-Rock are usually converted from guitar players, so integration of bass techniques like popping, harmonics and slapping are visibly absent. Instead, these techniques are quite apparent in this century.

- Decent guitar solo. Don’t expect guitar at the level of Malmsteen or Steve Vai during the period. Solo usually clock around 30 seconds, and never meant to make the song outlandish. In 硝子の肖像, the solo comes in at about 2 min 20 seconds into the music.

** In some cases, bass solo are featured instead of a guitar solo. Notable examples include Like an Angel (by Kuroyume) and Cage (by Dir en Grey).

- Mid to high pitched male singer. Lots of J-Rock singers fall into this portfolio, like Ryuichi Kawamura (Luna Sea), Toshi (X-Japan), Hakuei (Penicillin), Gackt (Malice Mizer), Kiyoharu (Kuroyume) to name but a few.

- Decent drummers, not totally outstanding. Drummers in japanese rock are probably more memorable in this century.

- Well-constructed intro and outro to the song, often needing either the lead or rhythm guitarist to play at one octave higher than the rest.

- Music that is acceptable by the mainstream media. J-Rock of this era are often considered wrongly as a sell-out of the band’s independent roots, seeking to attract sales through outlandish visual performances and not yet with safe lyrics.

Up till today, this song remains one of my favourite and one of the mainstay in my rock playlist (together with meet again).

Os conheci hoje. Dupla formada por Juka, ex-Moi dix Mois e Kouichi, ex-Laputa. O vídeo que deixo logo abaixo é da canção Mezame, que está presente no primeiro mini-álbum deles, lançado há 10 dias atrás. Isso mesmo, é uma banda recente formada por duas pessoas. É legal e vale uma olhada!

Arrivo ovviamente in ritardo, ma questa è davvero una bella notizia, che vale la pena di scrivere.
Il bellissimo film d’animazione dello Studio Ghibli  Il mio vicino Totoro (となりのトトロ – Tonari no Totoro) uscirà nelle sale cinematografiche italiane il prossimo 18 settembre.

La notizia è ufficiale e data dal sito della casa di distribuzione LUCKY RED.

Chissà che qualcosa non si stia muovendo dopo la sciagurata avventura dei film dello Studio Ghibli in mano alla Buena Vista. Infatti la Buena Vista fece uscire solo La principessa Mononoke e Kiki’s delivery service, salvo poi mettere entrambe le opere fuori catalogo nel giro di poco tempo (tra l’altro entrambe soffrirono di una versione italiana decisamente non eccelsa…).
Nel 2003 circolò la notizia (e anche qualcosa in più, visto che c’erano dei cartelloni…) dell’uscita in contemporanea di Porco Rosso e Laputa, ma tra annunci, smentite e rinvii, uscì solo Laputa nel 2004, a cui toccò un destino analogo a quello degli altri film: in breve tempo finì fuori catalogo (stessa sorte toccò anche all’edizione spagnola che conteneva anche l’audio italiano…).
E non dimentichiamoci di Nausicaa della Valle del Vento. Nel lontano 1986 la RAI decise di doppiarlo e di trasmetterlo in 4 puntate, ma purtroppo anche questa opera cadde nell’oblio: non ne fu mai realizzata una versione né in VHS né in DVD (gli unici che si trovano non sono altro che registrazioni fatte all’epoca oppure di montaggi tra il video giapponese e l’audio italiano).

Speriamo che l’iniziativa della LUCKY RED porti al successo sperato e che riusciremo a vedere anche opere da noi inedite nonché una riedizione di quello che, per poco, abbiamo già visto. Le premesse ci sono tutte.

I was recently quite shocked by Disney’s dubbing of  Hayao Miyazaki’s movies, specially   (Castle in the Sky (Tenkû no shiro Rapyuta) and Kiki’s Delivery Service (Majo no takkyûbin). These are widely held as masterpieces in animation, so that they would seem to deserve special care. On the other hand, they fall in dangerous “children’s territory”. Some may be isolated in the dubbing process:

• Translation, which is bound to introduce variations. Unfortunately, this will apply to subtitles also, unless they are used as visual aids to the listening. (In my case, this holds for English movies, certainly not for Japanese ones.)
• Voice acting. For Miyazaki’s, and other movies from Studio Ghibli, this has been also criticized. In my opinion, the acting is usually excellent, and performed by top-notch actors: Anna Paquin, Elle and Dakota Fanning (cute to have sisters dubbing fictional sisters), Janeane Garofalo, Phil Hartman, Kirsten Dunst …
• Adaptation. This is the part where I was shocked.

Adaptation would concern the question of what to dub in order to adapt the movie to a different audience (also, the musical soundtrack). It seems in order to Westernize these movies:

• completely new dialog is inserted, often to fill “empty” sequences (the usual Western horror vacui)
• same with music score: just as in stores, it seems some music must be playing, or else we, poor Westerners, get bored
• “foreign” features (humour, cultural references) are altered or eliminated
• some characters acquire new personalities

Don’t be to quick about taking the easy way and blame Disney for it all.  Studio Ghibli has carefully supervised the dubbing, and Miyazaki himself seems to have approved it. My very personal (and perhaps wrong) explanation is that the Japanese are trying their best to adapt a product to a “new” market.

But, they are wrong: people, and very specially children, should be open to new ways of storytelling, and be exposed to a sensibility different to the predominant one. That’s what I think, at least, and that’s what I am trying to do, even if my kids have to endure the original Japanese and I have to do all the reading…

What follows is extracted from wikipedia articles on Castle in the Sky and Kiki’s Delivery Service, with my comments. See also my book about Studio Ghibli (nice feature, wikipedia books.)

Castle in the Sky

• A significant quantity of background chatter and one-liners were added (even more so than in Disney’s dub of Kiki’s Delivery Service), filling in moments of silence and increasing the frenetic effect of certain scenes.

This is just amazing. In the first sequence, the pirates just keep chatting and talking like mad because, of course, we have to hear what they are saying (even from 100 meters away), we need to be told what they are planning (the tension!). Of course, music should be playing because we can’t stand old, boring, wind howling. Then, I switched to Japanese and never went back.

• Composer Joe Hisaishi was commissioned to rework and extend his original synthesizer-composed 37-minute soundtrack into a 90-minute piece for symphony orchestra in an effort to make the film more accessible to US audiences who are accustomed to a more substantial musical accompaniment.

The same thing here. I absolutely loved the landing in the Castle, when after the storm not a single sound is heard (ok, I did check the audio to make sure that was on purpose). It seems we Westerners cannot stand silence.

• Pazu and Sheeta, as portrayed by James Van Der Beek and Anna Paquin, are made to sound as several years older, placing them in their mid-teens, rather than their pre-teens.

Why oh why? They are still so clearly children!

• Several modifications were made to dialogue spoken to/about Sheeta by members of the Dola gang, including a declaration of love from one of the pirates. In the original Japanese version, the dialogue presented Sheeta as a potential mother figure for the pirates, instead of a potential romantic interest.

Thereby destroying the charm of the Dola gang’s boys, who are pictured as big children (similarly to the pirates in Porco Rosso).

• References to Robert Louis Stevenson’s Treasure Island were removed, as was the reference to Jonathan Swift’s Gulliver’s Travels.

… Words fail me. So, the movie is originally called “Laputa: Castle in the Sky”, an explicit homage to Swift, but then the reference is dropped! The beautiful reference to Treasure Island (easily, my favourite adventure book) is also gone. If this is not dumbing down kids, I don’t know what is.

(Incidentally, the word “Laputa” dropped from the title, too, but that’s due to the word sounding so ugly in the Spanish language.)

Kiki

The character of the cat Jiji changed slightly. In the Japanese version, Jiji is voiced by a female performer, while in the American version Jiji has a more distinct male voice — possibly for fear audiences would think he is female, until he develops a romantic interest in the white Persian cat living nearby — and also has more of a wisecracking demeanor. In Japanese culture, cats are usually depicted with feminine voices, whereas in American culture their voices are more gender-specific.

OK, this is a change I can live with. The assumed default gender for animals is always troublesome (why do you call a squirrel “she”? an American friend once asked us.)

In the original Japanese script, Jiji loses his ability to communicate with Kiki permanently, but in the American version a line is added that implies he is able to speak (or she to understand him) again. Miyazaki has said that Jiji is the immature side of Kiki, and this implies that Kiki, by the end of the original Japanese version, has matured beyond talking to her cat.

This is outrageous, changing the ending of the movie. I don’t think this was done so much as to keep a completely happy ending (the ending is quite happy as it is, as tends to be the case with Miyasaki-san), but to leave everything explained. It seems at the end of the movie, everything must be nice and clear, and no room for interpretation (such as the one the author provides) should be left. This is in contrast with many other movies, such as My Neighbor Totoro, where numerous questions are left open.

Update: Unbelievable: I found out the Spanish dubbing spoils one of the most touching scenes in Kiki’s. When she returns from her first delivery, she finds a delivery sign on the bakery’s window, made out of bread. We watch from the outside as she goes inside, inquires Osono about it, then hugs her husband, the baker. No sound is needed in this marvelous scene… but Spanish translators seem to think otherwise – we are therefore able to hear the superfluous dialog (from outside the shop!), lest out little heads miss something: “Who made this sign?”, “Well, my husband did!”, etc…

I just sold a yarn that I never posted here. I’m thrilled it’s going to be used! But it’s prettiness as a skein, too, must be preserved somewhere…

This photo's lighting makes pearly colors like shells or watercolor landscapes...

I love the splashes of unexpected color in this–I mostly worked with a periwinkle mohair that was hand-dyed and variegated in itself. Then I added touches of Corriedale roving from Ashford–the greens, and bolder purples. There’s also natural colored off-white and charcoal wool. It was so much fun to make!

the whole skein

Laputa Drifting refers to Castle in the Sky by Hayao Miyazaki. The land is a cyborg of tree and machine, mostly shut down but still drifting masked in the upper atmosphere of Earth. The largely blue tone of this suggest the sky–the green and charcoal touches are more the colors of the actual land. The overall impression matched some of the screenshots to my mind, though.

Castle In the Sky, Hayao Miyazaki

could never get tired of these colors...

the silkiest and most photogenic skein I've made yet...

Another View of Laputa