I was shocked when I heard that The Wind Rises was going to be Hayao Miyazaki’s final film. Princess Mononoke was the movie that made me realize that anime was more than the Sailor Moon and Dragon Ball/Dragon Ball Z I watched after school as a kid. Miyazaki is the Martin Scorsese of anime. He’s what would have happened if Akira Kurosawa had ventured into animation. How Miyazaki has not won more Oscars is beyond me. Disney pales in comparison.
So now that I’ve had my fanboy moment, let’s get to the heart of this review. The movie. The Wind Rises takes place in pre WWII Japan and revolves around a young boy named Jiro who dreams of sushi… wait… no, that was something else. Okay, I got it. Jiro is a boy who dreams about planes! It’s a movie based off the life of Jiro Horikoshi who designed fighter planes during WWII. The movie had many smaller story lines but the main one revolved around Jiro and his quest to make a perfect plane.
The Wind Rises found a way to be exactly what I thought it was going to be while surprising me the whole way. Anyone who has ever watched a Miyazaki movie knows that he leans heavily towards the fantastical running the gamut from magical realism to full on fantasy (catbus anyone?) and this movie leaned more towards the magical realism side of the scale. The art portrayed the classic idea of pre WWII Japan with nothing different about it. The fantasy aspect came into play when Jiro would daydream and he’d suddenly find himself walking on the wing of a plane or having imaginary conversations with people.
The main story line felt fleshed out and satisfying. It’s easy to follow the journey of his rise in the aeronautic world. The rest of the story, however, seems brushed aside and forgotten. A great example of this is the main love story. Since I try to write spoiler free reviews, I’ll just say that the love story is mostly implied with certain parts of it taking center stage for short periods of time. But no matter what is going on in Jiro’s life, it always comes back to planes. There was one part of the movie where Jiro is on a vacation and the movie only minimally hints and what brought him there. There’s a very small political intrigue story line but Miyazaki ran right back to the planes and left me guessing at what happened. The side stories were so understated that I didn’t shed even a single tear during a part that should have been quite touching. This is where The Wind Rises falls flat on its face. Its lack of focus on the side stories made me apathetic to them.
Normally if a movie pulled the kind of crap The Wind Rises pulled, then I’d be writing a scathing and angry review right about now. However, The Wind Rises was still good. Miyazaki’s charm and the main storyline were enough to keep me from hulking out and storming out of the theater.
Many of you may be wondering why I’m even bothering writing this review so late. The movie is out of most theaters by this point. The reason I even bothered writing this is because The Wind Rises is worth seeing. It was a nice movie which made me smile. It’s not, however, worth the price of admission to a movie theater. Rent this movie, borrow it from a friend, or even buy it if you already have a plethora of Miyazaki movies. But don’t feel bad if you missed it in theaters.
Also, keep in mind that Miyazaki has retired before. Let’s hope that he decides that 73 is a little too young to retire and he gives us another movie on par with Spirited Away or Princess Mononoke.
