The rumours are true: following the departure of legendary animator, director, producer and screenwriter Hayao Miyazaki, Japan's beloved Studio Ghibli -- of "My Neighbour Totoro" fame -- has announced that it is considering ceasing production of feature films after 29 years. The announcement comes from the studio's general manager, Toshio Suzuki, on Japanese television.
Studio Ghibli won't be closing entirely, but restructuring -- it will maintain a small staff for managing its trademarks and the Ghibli Museum in Tokyo, as well as its freelance division for producing advertisements and music videos. With Hayao Miyazaki and Isao Takahata both retired -- whose films were expensive, but profitable -- the studio can no longer afford to pay staff.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by stormwyrm on Wednesday August 06 2014, @07:49AM
We all loved Miyazaki's works, most especially Totoro, Spirited Away (yes Miyazaki got a well-deserved Oscar for this masterpiece), Nausicaa, and Princess Mononoke. We did manage to visit the Ghibli Museum once on a visit to Japan and we had a lot of fun there. Oh well, I suppose Miyazaki had his time and he's getting on in his years (he's 73), and his most recent work just didn't have the same sort of magic as his earlier stuff did. My son enjoyed Ponyo well enough, but the other films he's done since then aren't at the same level. They're enjoyable but aren't the great masterpieces he did in the past. Studio Ghibli is so closely associated with him and with his friend Isao Takahata (who in his turn made Grave of the Fireflies: another haunting masterpiece) and I don't think their style could be replicated by anyone else. They could start producing films done by others but they'd hardly have the same touch as the works of Miyazaki and Takahata that it wouldn't feel like a Ghibli production any more. It's like Lucasfilm's raison d'etre after Star Wars.
Numquam ponenda est pluralitas sine necessitate.
(Score: 2, Interesting) by wantkitteh on Wednesday August 06 2014, @10:07AM
Grave of the Fireflies still haunts me. It'll be another 15-20 years until I'm ready to rewatch that one. Keep meaning to buy Princess Mononoke, for some reason it always gets the shocking graphic violence edited out of it when it's on TV in the UK and that just ruins Ashitaka's character.
I respect the decision to draw a line under Studio Ghibli while they're still up in the stratosphere, I'm more worried about them going through the gradual decline and hideous humiliation that Disney's hand-drawn sequel-churning period (Pocahontas II - *shudders*)
Lucasfilm definitely showed the world how not to respect your own content in the search for th beeg moneh and even though I have the original untouched original Star Wars trilogy on DVD... my sister explained it best when she say that simply knowing that "that version" of "that scene" exists is retroactively detrimental to our individual opinion of the entire canon, no matter how much we try not to let it bother us.
(Score: 2) by Vanderhoth on Wednesday August 06 2014, @10:41AM
It's a shame Miyazaki's son wouldn't take over. He went in to landscaping... But he has some talent too. He did Tales From Earthsea as a kind of dare or something and it was really good, IMHO. It very much reminded me of watching Nausicaa, the very first anime I ever watched.
This is really a sad ending to a great studio, but as another commenter said, I guess it's better than having them make a bunch of crap for the next five years before closing their doors and be remembered for that instead of the amazing stuff Miyazaki and Takahata did.
"Now we know", "And knowing is half the battle". -G.I. Joooooe
(Score: 2) by Vanderhoth on Wednesday August 06 2014, @10:56AM
Guess I was a bit off the mark, Hayao Miyazaki *didn't* want his son to direct "Tales from Eartsea", but he ended up satisfied with the results. The movie was a $68 million hit world wide, but apparently received Japan's Bunshun Raspberry Award for "Worst Director", heart breaking.
I didn't realize GorÅ Miyazaki had directed "From up on Poppy Hill" (2011), which my wife and I really enjoyed.
"Now we know", "And knowing is half the battle". -G.I. Joooooe
(Score: 2) by goodie on Wednesday August 06 2014, @02:59PM
The father and son don't seem to be in great terms to be honest. Sounds like Goro will never be able to do good by him (which may be true but as a father you usually want to limit the negative talk to your own son).
(Score: 3, Funny) by Vanderhoth on Wednesday August 06 2014, @03:30PM
Can you really blame him?
Kids got serious talent and what's he do? becomes a landscaper...
That's like me building a company as big as Microsoft or Oracle from the ground up and my daughter having the potential to be an awesome electrical engineer or developer, but deciding to be a hair dresser. I'd be like, "fuck you too kid, get out of my house."
"Now we know", "And knowing is half the battle". -G.I. Joooooe
(Score: 2) by goodie on Wednesday August 06 2014, @06:02PM
Especially for an Asian... "How come you no doctor? You have no shame, you need to study and work hard! If your friend works 50 hours a week, you work 100 hours a week! And then you take over your daddy's business, keep the business in the family, with the bloooooood!"
(Score: 2) by goodie on Wednesday August 06 2014, @03:05PM
I am a huge fan of Ghibli's work, more specifically Miyazaki's movies. Porco Rosso is by far my favorite of them (probably because that's how I discovered their movies since it's one of the first that came to France when anime became popular over there), and it also has great dubbing in French even though I can't stand dubbing usually (good job Jean Reno).
But I digress. Recent movies from them haven't attracted me as much to be honest. They continue to be great, but not as great as they were to me before. I am still waiting for Kaze Tachinu and have heard great things about it.
It's a shame to see it go (well, in its current form at least) but to be honest the studio is so closely linked to its two fathers that I didn't quite see it go anywhere else after their departure. Part of me thinks that that's the reason Miyazaki stuck around longer than expected as well. My only request is to finally have a decent, fully fledged, box set of Ghibli movies (or even 2 sets, one for Miyazaki one for Takahata). To this day, they have all turned out to be disappointments. I would sell my kidneys for that actually :p.
I can't wait to watch those movies with my son. Hotaru no Haka however is another story. Everybody I know who has seen it (I watched it when I was 18) has been traumatized by that movie. I own it but haven't watched it since. It's just too powerful for me.
(Score: 1) by bziman on Wednesday August 06 2014, @06:42PM
Laputa: Castle in the Sky remains one of my all time favorite films. Most of Miyazaki's work are among my favorites. I especially love his collaboration with Joe Hisaishi. Hisaishi is only 63 and has a ton of beautiful movie scores left to write. I hope we haven't heard the last from Studio Ghibli.