Howl’s Moving Castle (2004)

Howl’s Moving Castle: 2004, dir. Hayao Miyazaki. Seen at Arbor Great Hills (June 17).
Howl’s Moving Castle (aka Hauru no ugoku shiro) is still in a few theaters, and if it’s playing near you, I recommend seeing it in the theater, whether it is dubbed or subtitled. The best thing about this movie is the way it looks, and the charming little details of animation, which might be lost on a smaller TV screen.
I was pleased that the Arbor decided to show the subtitled version of Howl’s Moving Castle instead of the dubbed version. I doubt the movie loses much being dubbed, because I have seen other Miyazaki movies dubbed by Disney and they do a great job. But I thought I would prefer the subtitled version just the same.

(The Arbor had big signs around the theater letting everyone know that WARNING, Howl’s Moving Castle was subtitled and not dubbed, as if it were a liability. Admittedly some people had small children with them and it might have been difficult for the non-reading kids to follow along with the movie. On the other hand, the movie was so visual that maybe it didn’t matter.)
I owned a copy of Diana Wynne Jones’ book Howl’s Moving Castle, which I had bought but not read, and which I was inspired to read on the weekend before the movie opened in Austin. I noticed that very few of the reviews I read of Howl’s Moving Castle mentioned the book—my guess was that most reviewers hadn’t read it.
Good, I thought, I can review this movie from the unusual point of view of someone who actually has read the book.
It doesn’t matter, though.
Miyazaki took the shell of the story behind Howl’s Moving Castle and stuffed it with his own story, his own agenda, and his inimitable style of animation. Some of the characters have the same names, and there is a moving castle, and Sophie (or Sofi, if you are watching the subtitled movie) is cursed with the same transformation near the beginning.
I had a slight advantage in some ways in having read the book, because I could understand some things that my boyfriend, who had not read the book, found confusing. For example, I understood and liked the way that Sofi’s curse kept wavering and that you could see it visually; I thought it was a wonderful way of showing how the curse was something that she actually embraced at times, not something beyond her control, and how it was tied in to her feelings about other people. In fact, I think the visualization of her curse was an improvement over the book, but if non-readers were confused by it, maybe not.
On the other hand, I was completely thrown when soldiers started appearing everywhere and characters began to discuss the war. The war subplot is entirely Miyazaki’s and has very little to do with the book.
I liked the characterizations better in the book, because the book had the time and ability to show us more dimensions of Howl, Sofi, and other characters. The storyline of the movie often takes precedence over character development. That’s not unusual in movie adaptations of books. I also missed Sophie’s turning out to be a witch who can charm things by talking to them, which isn’t the case in the film.
The movie of Howl’s Moving Castle, however, was visually arresting. When I read the book, I didn’t quite understand how the moving castle worked, and I couldn’t get a clear picture of it in my head. In the movie, the moving castle is simply marvellous, it’s almost like a living creature. Miyazaki cannot resist putting eyes and a mouth on damn near anything.
(In fact, after you see one of his movies, you start envisioning little faces on all kinds of inanimate objects. After this movie, I looked at my new purse and realized that the little grommets and the zipper on the front of it do form a cute happy face, perfect for a Miyazaki film.)
There are a lot of trademark Miyazaki touches, like the scarecrow. In the book, the scarecrow scares Sophie and she keeps away from it as much as possible. In the movie, however, he’s a cute helpful scarecrow who bounces around on a supporting stick, following the moving castle, catching Sofi’s hat for her, and generally being amusing. In both the book and the movie, the scarecrow ends up hiding something significant, but that turns out to be much, much different in the movie than in the book.
Both the movie and the book end messily. I had to read the end of the book twice to figure out exactly what had happened. The ending of the movie is entirely different—the war subplot figures heavily—and it was even weirder. Maybe I don’t know enough about Japanese history and culture to understand some key element of the movie’s ending, but the deus ex machina was … odd.
Despite the strange ending, Howl’s Moving Castle was a fascinating, memorable movie. The images can stick in your head for days. And next thing you know, your desk lamp, your shoes, and your purse will all start to look like cute little Miyazaki characters. Funny how the Arbor didn’t issue a warning about that.
A postscript: I thought it was funny that the trailers we saw before Howl’s Moving Castle were all for 3D animated films, because as you know, traditional animation is all but obsolete and no one will pay to see it in theaters anymore. So a packed theater at the Arbor all squirmed restlessly through previews of 3D animated films that quite frankly, looked downright ugly at times (those chickens, or pigeons, or whatever they are in Valiant were repulsive), and the minute the Studio Ghibli logo appeared on screen, the theater rang with applause. Howl’s Moving Castle, a traditionally animated film, has grossed more than $160 million worldwide. Traditional animation is dead? I don’t think so.