If Hayao Miyazaki’s Japanese animation could be transposed to the Western world, Ponyo would be a watercolor illustration to Spirited Away’s Baroque portrait. The recent film is a diluted version of the artistic, thematic, and narrative elements that gave Miyazaki cross-generational appeal, limiting him instead to young audiences. For audience members over the age of seven, the world of Sasuke and his friend Ponyo is not dull or lacking in detail, but it is tame and at times tedious. Thankfully, easily-entertained children are too mesmerized to question narrative inconsistencies or underdeveloped thematic ideas––Ponyo has enough charm to captivate children, but offers little substance for adults expecting a film in the vein of Princess Mononoke, Spirited Away, or Howl’s Moving Castle.
Ponyo’s simplified, watercolor animation style matches its simplified, watered-down characters, themes, and conflicts. Fans of Miyazaki’s past work will recognize familiar elements, such as youthful protagonists, magical realism, tensions between generations, and environmentalism. Beyond these general similarities, specific differences within Ponyo make it a poor representation of (or introduction to) Miyazaki’s style. The protagonist, Sasuke, is younger than the protagonists of PM, SA, or HMC at age five; the film is aimed at an audience of comparable age, while PM, SA, or HMC are best enjoyed by teenagers and adults.
Despite it’s suitability for young audiences, Ponyo is more realistic than PM, SA, or HMC, which all take place in fantasy worlds with pervasive magic use. Ponyo takes place more or less in the real world, with magical elements confined to a few members of the ocean, and no one else. Like real people, the characters are ambiguous and uncertain, but have too little time to develop during the film’s 106 minutes, or their growth is limited by their age or objectives (Sasuke starts and ends the film loving Ponyo, with no doubt in between). There is no grand conflict shown or implied, and no violence whatsoever. The environmentalism theme gets off to a strong start, but is later overtaken by the theme of love.
The film’s voice acting, like the animation, is solid and appropriate. Liam Neeson, however, was miscast: his distinctive voice never belonged to his character and inhibited my suspension of disbelief. Whether due to bad writing or poor acting, his dialogue seemed stilted, especially during the first half of the film. I find it interesting that, although the plot and characters are meant for a young audience, the American voice actors are meant to appeal to teenagers and adults.
Unfortunately, the film’s most interesting characters––Sasuke, Lisa (his mother), and Fujimoto (Ponyo’s father)––are interesting because of their inconsistencies or the questions they raise, not because of any actual depth of character.
The film puts Sasuke at age 5, yet he acts likes a child of at least twice that age and is treated as such by other characters. Lisa has no qualms leaving him home alone, nor do other adults think it odd when he pilots a boat by himself. By the end of the film, he is asked to publicly declare his love for Ponyo in what amounts to either an arranged marriage or an adoption ceremony––the film leaves ambiguous his exact relationship with Ponyo.
Even more ambiguous is Fujimoto, who has the all the trappings of a villain but turns out to be a harmless father. He is the ocean sorcerer marked by strange hair, eclecticism, magic powers, henchmen, and a distaste for humans. Early in the film, Fujimoto curses humans for polluting the earth and says that, when his magic well is full, he will restore the Earth to the pre-cambrian age and bring about the end of human life. This desire is soon forgotten; he spends the rest of the film worrying about his daughter and trying to keep the Earth in balance, of which humans are apparently a part.
Lisa is an average, fallible mother, prone to leaving her five-year-old alone and drinking in front of him. But the film doesn’t give her anything interesting to do, as she is just pulled along for the ride. She accepts without hesitation that an odd-looking goldfish found by her son has transformed into a human girl and is living in her house. Later, an off-screen conversation with Ponyo’s mother seems to settle any doubts she has about adopting Ponyo following the odd marriage/adoption scene.
The most troubling and unnecessary character is Sasuke’s father Koichi, who spends the entirety of the film on a ship and says about four words to his son. When a typhoon brews, it seems certain that he will be swept to sea and require a rescue by Ponyo and company. But this would be too exciting. The great playwright Anton Chekhov tells us that “One must not put a loaded rifle on the stage if no one is thinking of firing it.” So it is with Koichi. The film gives Koichi just enough importance that his overall insignificance is troubling.
Ponyo is distributed in the U.S. by Disney, and comparisons to Disney films are unavoidable. Miyazaki took his inspiration for Ponyo from The Little Mermaid; both feature a sea creature that transforms into a human and finds love on green earth. However, I contend that Ponyo is not about the “mermaid” but rather Sasuke, her human friend. In this light, Ponyo more closely resembles Disney-Pixar’s Wall-E: a young male befriends an unlikely young female, follows her home (Sasuke’s island becomes covered in water), and protects the environment before winding up on green earth again. That said, Ponyo does not feature a villain, struggle between good and evil, or even violence––aspects that can be expected from every modern Disney film.
Two elements of the film also reminded me of videogames in The Legend of Zelda series. In Ponyo, the Earth is thrown out of balance and endangered by the falling moon, which is the same threat used in the 2000 game The Legend of Zelda: Majora’s Mask. The film also takes place on an island, later flooded by water, which the protagonist navigates on a small boat. In 2002, The Legend of Zelda: Wind Waker featured a world covered almost entirely by water, with a large amount of time spent sailing. Both pieces also include significant events that happen in an air bubble under the ocean. I wonder if Miyazaki is at all aware of The Legend of Zelda, another piece of Japanese media that has been successful in America. I certainly see similarities between him and Shigeru Miyamoto, the Japanese creator of The Legend of Zelda.
