The Wind Rises: Miyazaki’s Final Farewell

Hello everybody! For today’s anime club we have Miyazaki’s final film The Wind Rises.

THE WIND RISES

DIRECTOR: Hayao Miyazaki 

STARRING: Hideaki Anno, Miori Takimoto, Hidetoshi Nishijima, Masahiko Nishimura, Steve Alpert, Morio Kazama, Keiko Takeshita, Mirai Shida, Jun Kunimura, Shinobu Otake, Nomura Mansai

EPISODES: 1 Film

GENRE: Animated, Historical, Fantasy, Adventure

YEAR: 2013

COUNTRY: Japan

Jiro dreams of flying and designing beautiful airplanes, inspired by the famous Italian aeronautical designer Caproni. Nearsighted from a young age and unable to be a pilot, Jiro joins a major Japanese engineering company in 1927 and becomes one of the world’s most innovative and accomplished airplane designers. The film chronicles much of his life, depicting key historical events, including the Great Kanto Earthquake of 1923, the Great Depression, the tuberculosis epidemic and Japan’s plunge into war. Jiro meets and falls in love with Nahoko, and grows and cherishes his friendship with his colleague Honjo.

The Wind Rises is an interesting anime biopic brought to us by the mind of Miyazaki. The film’s main character, Jiro, is an intriguing character. He wants to be a pilot but is near-sighted, so he designs them instead. He is the inventor of the Zero plane used during WWII. The film follows his life and focuses quite well on the different relationships of the characters that he encounters. The relationship to focus on his with the Italian designer Caproni. One recommendation is to go see this film with the intent of learning about Japanese history, as this focuses on major events throughout recent history.

Let me put this out there right now, The Wind Rises is not a traditional Miyazaki film. It is definitely not along the lines of Spirited Away or Princess Mononoke. So don’t go into The Wind Rises and expect a wonderful fantasy world full of wonder and magic. That being said, the film is relatively long (2+hours) and as a Western audience member there were some moments I zoned out. I quickly snapped out of it, but it may not be as easy for others. I do recommend to watch it subtitled in English as I can’t comment on the English voice actors.

PROS:

• Main character development
• Character relationships
• Interesting biopic.

CONS:

• Non-traditional Miyazaki.
• Length
• Pacing
• Unless you do your homework on a little Japanese history, you won’t get out as much as you should.

SCORE: 5.5 / 10

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