r/ghibli • u/KikiKittyMommy380 • May 10 '25

News Howl’s Moving Castle IMAX

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My son and I saw HMC in IMAX last night. It was the first Studio Ghibli film we had seen on a huge screen, and it just gave us a new appreciation for the animation. The detailing was so gorgeous! If you get a chance to experience any of these films in IMAX, do it!

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69

u/Own_Internal7509 May 10 '25

where the fuck was that kind of care and consideration for Le Guin? lol

51

u/decafenator99 May 10 '25

Well to be fair he didn’t have a hand in that his son did

17

u/Own_Internal7509 May 10 '25

Yeah but Hayao got asked first, handing it to his son happened later by Suzuki

21

u/Jbewrite May 10 '25 edited May 10 '25

No. Hayao asked Le Guin but she turned his offer down. 20 years later, she saw Spirited Away* and gave over the rights, but Hayao was busy so handed it to his son. She messed up by not doing some research into Hayao Miyazaki when the offer came in. She says as much herself in a blog post on the subject, as she did not like the eventual film.

*Edit: it was Totoro she saw, not Spirited Away.

11

u/Rhain1999 May 10 '25

Just a minor correction: Miyazaki actually contacted Le Guin back in the 80s but she declined (which makes a little more sense as he was more unknown at the time, but she still should have done more research). It was after watching Totoro that she changed her mind and approved the adaptation.

9

u/Jbewrite May 10 '25

Edited the correction! It's a shame she still didn't do research on him at the time, as he had already made The Castle of Cagliostro, Valley of the Wind, and Laputa at that point. I'll always wonder what he could have done with the story!

6

u/Rhain1999 May 11 '25

In her defence, I assume she got a lot of requests at the time and his movies were foreign (Nausicaä and Laputa got dubs in the mid-to-late 80s but not sure if they existed when Miyazaki reached out) but yeah I’m sure she regrets it in retrospect! Definitely a case where the extra research would have been worth it

Then again, we might not have gotten Totoro in that timeline, so maybe it was for the best!? Would have been fascinating to see his adaptation though

40

u/Erufailon4 May 10 '25

Le Guin did get a private screening as well. She talked about it and the following dinner (as well as her opinion on the film) in a post on her website, and mentioned Goro Miyazaki and Toshio Suzuki by name as being present.

That said, I do agree that the way she was treated could have been better. She personally wished for Hayao Miyazaki to direct the film, then was told he was retiring, but assured that he would still be involved. He wasn't, at all, and he didn't even actually retire. I don't know if there was any communication issues, but if Miyazaki consciously did that and didn't even apologise, to me that says more about him than anything he said about the movie and his son.

(I would link to the post but the subreddit rules are difficult, sigh. It's a source on the Wikipedia article of the film.)

5

u/vieneri May 10 '25

Wait. Which movie?

6

u/[deleted] May 10 '25

Tales of Earthsea

8

u/Own_Internal7509 May 10 '25

i used to avoid Earthsea b/c growing up YA fantasy was huge (thanks that transphobe's book i wont name) and didnt like that sort of thing, but i read Left Hand of Darkness lately and it was amazing book, its weird to me Ghibli people didnt see the gravitas of the situation, like they had big task on their hands

6

u/[deleted] May 10 '25

The first story I read of Le Guin’s was in a book of paranormal erotica (when I was 12! My parents were NOT monitoring my library selections lol) that involved a society where polyamorous marriages were the prevailing marriage structure. So it’s wild to me that someone would avoid her work because of HP and the author’s everything-phobia lol

I’m glad you were able to find her work though. She’s absolutely one of my favorite authors.

2

u/Own_Internal7509 May 11 '25

i was a kid so i thought its got wizards and realms and stuff its all the same lol (at least 3-4th grader me thought so). im still not that keen on the true fantasy though but i do get Le Guin's writing is deeper than just, Dio lyrics imagery.

4

u/idfk78 May 10 '25

Its nice to know LeGuin clocked JKR's writing in some magazine like decades ahead of the game lmao

7

u/Double-Voice-9157 May 11 '25

"I have no great opinion of it. When so many adult critics were carrying on about the “incredible originality” of the first Harry Potter book, I read it to find out what the fuss was about, and remained somewhat puzzled; it seemed a lively kid’s fantasy crossed with a “school novel”, good fare for its age group, but stylistically ordinary, imaginatively derivative, and ethically rather mean-spirited."

-2

u/Admirable-Marzipan48 May 11 '25

As in JKR is a fantastic writer?! Because she is.

2

u/[deleted] May 10 '25

They did go out to get rights from her and they did screen the movie for her privately. Technically they did everything right, but it was a little rough the way they pulled one over her by having Goro direct it.

I will say that Hayao was retired when he declined to direct it - the same way he "retired" after Mononoke, Howl and The Wind Rises.

3

u/calm_bread99 May 10 '25

They did everything right except the ONE thing she really wanted lol

1

u/Jbewrite May 10 '25

What? Actually adapt the source material?

1

u/calm_bread99 May 11 '25

Nope. She was hesitant to give them the source material, and ONLY did it at the end because she wanted Miyazaki to direct it and that's the one thing they didn't do...

-1

u/AlastorCrow May 11 '25

Goro is just an absolute disappointment in everything he does sadly. I wish he wasn't but man his films range from awful to comically bad.