Ponyo (2008)

Plot summary (with possible spoilers): Five-year-old Sosuke (voiced by Hiroki Doi) lives in a house high on a cliff with his mother Lisa (Tomoko Yamaguchi) and mostly-absent ship captain father Koichi (Kazushige Nagashima). One day while playing near the shore, Sosuke rescues a goldfish with a human face. He decides to keep her, naming her Ponyo in the process.

Ponyo (Yuria Nara), grateful to Sosuke for saving her, licks a cut on his finger. The finger heals instantly. Ponyo, having tasted human blood, now wants to turn into a human and live with Sosuke and his family. This greatly distresses Fujimoto (Joji Tokoro), Ponyo’s father, who lives under the sea with the rest of the marine creatures.

Fujimoto cannot stand humans because of their polluting ways; plus, he is worried about maintaining the delicate natural balance between humans and nature, which he fears will be thrown out of whack if Ponyo stays human. Nevertheless, he agrees to let her change — provided that Sosuke can lover her unconditionally in whatever form she may take.

The rest of the film then shows Sosuke and Ponyo interacting with each other while a great tsunami ravages the town where they live. This provided a bit of tension, since Sosuke and Lisa didn’t exactly live in a strong steel building, but rather a wooden house precariously balanced on a cliff. To make things worse, Lisa insists on venturing out at the height of the storm to check on the nursing home residents she cares for. When she fails to return, Sosuke and Ponyo set off on a rescue mission — leading to a final mystical encounter with Fujimoto.

Liked:

• The animation was simply stunning. Having recently seen (and loved) Toy Story 3 in all its CGI glory, there’s still something to be said for hand-drawn animation.
• I liked that Lisa wasn’t portrayed as the typical meek, timid Japanese housewife. She drove like a madwoman, got pissed at her husband when he didn’t come home on time, and slugged back beers. That’s much more believable to me!

Disliked:

• There wasn’t any urgency in this story, nor did I really understand what the characters were after. So there was going to be some sort of massive ecological disaster? Why? Because of one tiny goldfish becoming human? Okaaay…. Whatever.
• I didn’t really get into the Ponyo character that much. I’m not sure why, but she didn’t grab my attention like Sosuke did. As a result, I didn’t much care whether she stuck around or not.

Rating:

Overall, I was a bit disappointed by Ponyo (considering that it’s a Miyazaki film) and was definitely expecting a much more heartwarming story with far more lovable, memorable characters. I guess even great directors are allowed a slight misstep once in a while. I give this film 3 stars out of 5.