Movie: In a Corner of this World (この世界の片隅に )

"If I can die with the memory of the person I love, I'm satisfied."

好きな人の思い出しと死にしたら、本望じゃ。

I have always loved Japanese drama movies and I always cry every time the last scene fades to black. My senpai and good teacher Ms. Pauline Mangulabnan shared  me this movie "In a Corner of this World" and indeed it was a heartbreaking, heartwarming and inspirational film. I remembered other Japanese movies with the theme of World War II like Studio Ghibli's Grave of the Fireflies and Letters from Iwo Jima and they all made me cry. 

The cinematography of the film is equally sublime and stunningly unique. The first scene that pops out in the movie is a moving cart with a boy and a girl inside. The boy said it was a kidnapper's cage and told the little girl that once it stops they would escape together. Fade to black with the next scene of a woman, whose name was Suzu in bed with his husband Shusaku, the same little boy in the first scene, and they held hands. Then one will realize that both scenes are merely dreams when the third scene showed Suzu in bed, with bandages in her head. As she lifts her right arm, she realizes that her hand is gone from the time bomb that exploded during those times in war. 

Hiroshima. 1930s. Then comes the flashback when Suzu was to meet the man she would marry in a tradition called omiai (arranged marriage). Shusaku, the man she would marry, is part of the military corps. When they finally met, Shusaku said that he already knows Suzu by her mole, with Suzu clueless as to where they could have met. Suzu also met her longtime friend Tetsu and drew him a picture of him as a child and the ocean, the time when Tetsu's brother was killed in the navy war. 

Everything seems normal at first: as a housewife, Suzu worked hard in the house and served her husband well. During these times her husband was working in the military and they both lived in her parents' house, while her elder sister visits them with her daughter occasionally. A significant scene appears when Suzu got lost in the village and met Rin-san, a geisha who was kind and sweet. When she found out that Suzu is good at drawing, she made her draw a picture of a watermelon and caramel. Eventually they bid each other goodbye. 

A conflict arises when Suzu found out that her husband Shusaku seemed to know Rin-san as a customer, and becomes cold to him for a while. Tetsu visited Suzu and gave her an omiyage (present) of a bird's feather and said that it might be the last time they meet each other.

Before the war worsened, spring passed by and Rin and Suzu met again. They shared stories and Rin left Suzu with inspirational messages about the war.

Just because you're lacking a little something, doesn't mean there's no place for you in this world." (だれでもちいとたらもんがあるくらいで、この世界に場所はなくなら。)

The war came like a thunder afterwards and time bombs were scattered everywhere. Shusaku was promoted as a military commander and would be away for three whole months. Suzu endured this while taking care of her niece, Harumi but ended up getting blown by a time bomb hidden in the bushes and a fence, killing Harumi and taking her right hand. 

A part of Suzu was lost during that time because everything she did--cleaning the house, making Harumi a pouch, sketching drawings for her friend Tetsu and Rin and hugging her husband Shusaku became impossible without her right hand. She decided to wander off alone because she still could not accept the fact that her loved ones died and still they lost the war. Shusaku found her and invited her to come home. She said that her home could have been the fence where the time bomb was and then she would be with her loved ones--Harumi, Tetsu and Rin.

"I'll be your home. I hope it would be fine for you," Shusaku said in assurance.

In the end, Suzu returned home and finally accepted the realities of life during the war, and thanked her husband, who would always find her because of her mole, even during that time that she got lost when she was a kid and Shusaku helped her find her way home.

Such Japanese drama movies always make me cry and, and as a Linguistics student who studies Japanese,  appreciate the Japanese culture better. I have noticed that the characters use a Japanese dialect compared to the Japanese used in the cities. The general theme of the movie, I believe is finding one's place in the world even if he is nowhere near perfect, and moving on so that one can face the future with confidence and hope.

From Up the Poppy Hill: A Miyazaki Masterpiece

The ghosts of our pasts always haunt us, but sometimes, they lead us to identify who we really are, and who we'll be from then on.

I have always been an avid fan of Hayao Miyazaki's movies and apart from my favorite Whisper of the Heart, From Up the Poppy Hill is the second best love story I adore. The story revolves around a young girl Umi Matsuzaki, who would always raise signal flags for his father who had died in a supply ship during the Korean war. Little did she know that a certain someone was answering her signal flags, and even that someone even wrote a poem about her raising the flags in memory of her father. 

Meet Shun Kazama, the young boy who immediately but secretly falls in love with Umi. He is one of the editors of the weekly newspaper in their school and is part of the Journalism club. The basic conflict surfaces when their school principal and the chairman decide to abolish the Club building, which includes the Archeaology, Philosophy, Chemistry and other clubs mostly led by the boys of the Konan Academy. Umi, who befriends the handsome Shun, suggests that they should clean the place to make it look new. 

The work began and the love story of the two develops until a second conflict arises--when Shun and the other boys were invited for a small get together party at Umi's boarding house, Umi shows her a photo of his late father Yuichiro Sawamura and he is left speechless. He has the same photo and his foster father finally told him that Yuichiro is his true father, which makes the couple brothers and sisters. Shun gets cold towards Umi until he admits that they are indeed brother and sister. 

"It's just like a typical melodrama." Shun says.

However Umi admits that even though they are related, her feelings for him will never change. The same goes for Shun and they bade each other goodbye after they have talked to the chairman to come visit their new club building.

Umi's mother comes home from America and she asks her the truth about Shun. The mother then contacts Shun's foster father and they are both able to come in touch with the third person in the photo--the one who knows the truth. It becomes a moment of peace for all three of them--Captain Hiroshi Tachibana, Shun and Umi. It feels like a reunion for Hiroshi seeing the son and daughter of his late friends and he thanked them for the moment they finally met. 

I was moved by the last scene where Hiroshi held both their hands and thanked them for the opportunity to meet his best friends in a long time. I also loved how the movie depicted the Japanese culture of boarding houses, signal flags, school clubs, stencils that worked before xerox machines and passionate students who would save their club building no matter what. 

It was indeed a ghost of Shun and Umi's past that actually brought them together in the end. 

Revisiting the world of Master Animator Miyazaki Hayao

Master Animator Miyazaki Hayao

A cat bus. A moving castle. A princess raised by a wolf-god. None other than Studio Ghibli. None other than Miyazaki Hayao.

What I actually love about Studio Ghibli films is how they scare me and make me fall in love at the same time. With various themes each movie uniquely portrays, from love, friendship, death, importance of nature, dreams and memories, Miyazaki-sama, the master animator and director in Japan, was able to create an entirely  new world in the industry that not only imparted these heart-warming lessons for the eager young minds around the world, but also showcased a unique and creative trademark in animation that would always make us think twice whether we're really watching an animated film or a real-life one: that is, his realistic portrayal of the movies through water color painting.

ハウルの動く城

となりのトトロ

Studio Ghibli, spearheaded by the well-recognized animation creator Miyazaki Hayao, is a Japanese animation studio that has led us to the breath-taking realms of the castle in the sky, the hiding place of the cute Totoro and the jaw-dropping bath house run by spirits. Somehow it's not the usual places we imagine and want to go to when we're still kids, but such sceneries and the characters in each movie that somehow are always led by women or brave 10-year-old girls have stories that we can relate to in real life, more than love stories and happily-ever-afters that will only make us disappointed as we grow up.

These are some of the Studio Ghibli films:

1. Laputa: Castle in the Sky (天空の城ラピュタ)

A legend, a dream and an unbreakable friendship and love revolve around the story, where young boy Pazu embark on a journey to rescue and protect a mysterious young girl-princess named Sheeta from pirates and government secret agents because she possesses a powerful chrystal that could lead them to the legendary Laputa, a paradise rich in both nature and gold.

2. Howl's Moving Castle (ハウルの動く城)

A love story and a battle between good and evil--this outstanding movie places an 18-year-old lass in the abandoned and sinister territory of witches and wizards, where she meets and the notorious and handsome wizard Howl, and where she helps him break the spell he is under while, as a challenge, she is also under one.

3. Kiki's Delivery Service (魔女の宅急便)

Adapted from a Japanese children's book, the movie revolves around the wonderful journey of a young witch named Kiki as she heads to the big city to find her fortune, make new friends, inspire people and do good, and learn some new things and realities too.

4. Princess Mononoke (もののけ姫)

A story where there is no villain, Princess Mononoke is one of Mr. Miyazaki's best movies ever, where he said he "will not make any movies again in this way". Young warrior Ashitaka, cursed by a boar-god/demon set off to the forests of the west to be cured, but only to find out about the terrible feud between Iron Town and the gods of the forest led by a young woman named Mononoke. It  leads to an impossible love story and the quest to achieve peace between the two parties.

5. My Neighbor Totoro (となりのトトロ)

A magical hiding place, a cute forest-god and a cat bus: as sisters Satsuki and Mei move together with their father in a rather timeworn house in the countryside, they encounter small and huge furry creatures of the forest that help them cope up with the new place and teach them how to love the forest.

6. Ponyo (崖の上のポニョ)

A love story for the kids, Ponyo portrays an exquisite relationship of a young boy named Sosuke and a beautiful goldfish whom he named Ponyo after he found it by the shore. Upon using magic to become human, Ponyo quickly falls in love with the sweet boy but such is forbidden for it can cause disastrous imbalance to the world. The journey begins when both fight for their innocent love story and friendship and must pass a test to restore the world in order again.

7. Spirited Away (千と千尋の神隠し)

A world like you've never imagined before.

New place. New school. New friends. Chihiro doesn't seem to like the idea of moving and is further frightened to death when she and her parents made a wrong turn to a tunnel that led them to the world of the spirits. Further making mistakes, her parents are turned into pigs and Chihiro must find a way to bring them back with the help of a mysterious young man named Haku, and to actually help him in return.

8. Whisper of the Heart ((耳をすませば)

Writing a love story and watching your own love story unfold. Visiting the library, reading books and translating songs-- that's the Shizuku you would see everyday. Somehow her story takes an interesting turn when a new kid in school named Seiji mocks her songs, a stubborn cat leads her to a magical antique shop, and everything that followed paints a love story for her.

9. Grave of the Fireflies (火垂るの墓 )
World War II. Bombs. Air raids. What would you do if everyone you love, died one by one?
A story not only about war in the eyes of the innocent, but also about lost souls, Grave of the Fireflies is a tragic insightful movie about Seita and her sister Setsuko and how they tried to survive the war without a home, without money and without parents.

10. The Secret World of Arrietty (借りぐらしの ｱﾘｴｯﾃｲ)
Studio Ghibli's latest movie tells about a unique story of a young sickly boy named Sho and a tiny girl-borrower Arrietty, how they forged a forbidden friendship and proved "no friendship is too small".

Grave of the Fireflies: Saving the fruit drop

Where will you be… when she dies?

The war was not the story. It may have been the headlines in the papers or the unforgettable event written in the history textbooks. For a young boy, his sister’s death was the unforgettable event. Isao Takahata’s  Grave of the Fireflies (1988, a Hayao Miyazaki film) tells the tragic tale of Seita (Tsutomu Tatsumi) and his younger sister surviving World War II, and how they died with it.

The gloomy atmosphere focused on Seita: filthy, thin as stick, dying as he leans on a post at the train station. In the distance, his spirit and his sister’s watched him die, and both rode in a train to recall their miserable life during the war.

The sound of sirens and the words “air raid” were already familiar to his ears, as Seita, along with his sister Setsuko (Ayano Shiraishi) and their ill mother (Yoshiko Shinohara) prepared to store food underground and take cover to the shelter. However they parted ways with Seita and Setsuko struggling to reach for the shelter because of the chaos and had to improvise. When everything was back to normal, the children found out their mother was severely wounded with very little chance of survival.

The worms cannibalizing on his mothers’ dead flesh and the way she was thrown into the sea of fire for cremation was a nightmare Seita knew very well to be too much for his younger sister. Staying in their aunt’s house for a while, the boy tried very hard to divert Setsuko’s attention to forget their mom by bringing her to the beach, treating her with her favourite fruit drop and teaching her how to catch fireflies.

With their aunt taking advantage of their parents’ wealth, both decided to live off in an abandoned cave far from the city. At first they enjoyed improving the place but eventually struggled with food and water scarcity. Setsuko developed severe diarrhea because of the river water and malnutrition. Their mom had left them money in the back, but was of no use during the war because no one else would want to trade their goods.

Seita proved his love for his sister, giving up the noble honor as a Japanese citizen and as a son of a soldier by stealing goods whenever people run to the shelters during the air raids.

When the war was over and Seita was withdrawing money from the bank, he found out the Japanese lost and realized their dad had died, too. Left with almost nothing, he ran back to her dying sister and bought her lots of food. But it was too late. “She never woke up,” and now the young boy had to carry two boxes of ashes.

He eventually left the cave with his sister’s ashes in the fruit drop can, and died.

The movie always makes me cry even when I think about it, especially in the scene when Setsuko buried the fireflies they once used as lights for their cave one night, and asked Seita, “Why do fireflies have to die so soon?”