Sometimes here at AICN stories, scoops and interviews go to one person, when I would have given anything to have another do the same task. Here I have Moriarty... and he had the amazing good fortune to interview and speak and be in the presence of filmmaking GOD, Hayao Miyazaki. But many many miles away in Austin lay... sick to his stomach... Robogeek. Our resident Anime lover. More than that though there are only two people that Robogeek bows down and worships and credits for changing his filmgoing life. Miyazaki was one, Krzysztof Kieslowski was the other... whom Robogeek did get the chance to behold in his short time on this planet. But... as is often the case in this world, fate took a different path. And placed our resident Evil Genius across the table from this True Genius. Robogeek has been working non-stop setting this interview up, as well as arranging PRINCESS MONONOKE to be screened during the upcoming AUSTIN FILM FESTIVAL. One last thing before you move along. This week's RUMBLINGS is longer than usual and has been split up due to the limitations of this site's pre-programmed limits. At the bottom of the page you will see a link to the second part of the Rumblings containing many other fantastic bits from... Moriarty....
Hey, Head Geek...
"Moriarty" here.
The day started on a normal enough note. I rose
early, made my way to the kitchen where several
henchmen were preparing breakfast, found the eggs were
slightly too salty for my taste, killed said henchmen,
called in several replacement henchmen, killed them on
general principle, then finally calmed down a bit.
I'm not, generally speaking, a morning person. When
one of the frightened mutants brought me my Palm Pilot
so I could review my schedule, I was startled to
realize that today was the day... a very special
day... a day when I was set to meet a real-live,
no-joke, if-you-don't-know-it-yet-you-should genius,
Hayao Miyazaki.
I'd like to thank AICN's resident anime god Robogeek
for helping me prepare for this interview and for
making the whole thing happen in the first place. I
can't even pretend to be an expert on the subject,
which makes it convenient that we've got one we can
reach by hotline.
I called up FreeRide, one of AICN's new spies, and
asked him to bring over a copy of MY NEIGHBOR TOTORO
for us to watch. When he finally showed up five hours
later, dazed, breathless, and bloody, he tried to give
me some line about how hard it was to locate the
laserdisc copy of the Fox Video release of the 1995
American Troma dubbed version. He tried to explain
how many stores he had to visit, how he actually had
to knife-fight a clerk at Dave's Video (since I don't
rent... I own), and then avoid capture by the
authorities. All I cared about was the fact that I
was going to be able to see the film before meeting
the maker.
That makes three Miyazaki films I've seen now, and my
respect for the man as an artist grows by leaps and
bounds with each exposure to what he does. It was
KIKI'S DELIVERY SERVICE first (dubbed, and I loved it,
thanks), then a screening of the glorious new MONONOKE
release, and now this dubbed version of TOTORO. I
think the most remarkable thing about his work is the
strong individual voice of each film. There's no
mistaking who is responsible for these films. I know
that KIKI is based on a book, but that doesn't matter.
It's the gentle, spiritual tone of the storytelling,
the perfect renditions of details both mundane and
fantastic, the humanity of the characters.
Miramax has worked hard to introduce the phrase
"Miyazaki is Japan's Walt Disney" into the popular
consciousness over the last couple of years. You'll
find it in every single press release they send out
about him, and I think that's a perfectly fair
comparison. Both of them are singular stylists, men
who viewed animation as art. Both of them have
created characters that have become iconic, cultural
figures that overshadow individual films. I think
there's little doubt, though, that Miyazaki is the
greater artist of the two. His work is personal,
profound, and there's such a centered philisophical
center to the films I've seen that I find it hard to
believe that even a frame of it passed through the
hands of anyone but Miyazaki. It's the closest thing
I've ever seen to pure imagination onscreen, the raw
download of a director's dreams.
I remember my first viewing of KIKI. I had heard of
the film and the filmmaker, but didn't really know
what to expect when I found the recent Disney release
for rental. I took it home, played it, and then
played it again. And later that night, I played it
again. It was the flying scenes that hooked me, but
each viewing brought new moments into focus for me.
Each viewing made me appreciate some new bit of
character business or some stunning visual grace note.
And on each viewing, those flying scenes held up,
hypnotizing me. I'd never seen anything like it.
When we fly in our dreams, unfettered of any machinery
or gear or gravity, that feeling is the feeling that
Miyazaki somehow captures. It's the ideal, as perfect
as Sam Lowry's slow lazy tumbles through the cotton
candy clouds of BRAZIL.
In TOTORO, there are all sorts of images that I will
have to see again to fully appreciate. I can't wait
to get another look at the CatBus, a startling
creature that owes at least a slight visual nod to
Lewis Carroll and Tenniel's classic rendition of the
Chesire Cat. I am fascinated by the dustbunnies and
the Totoros. And once again, I was touched by these
characters. Mei, in particular, struck me as one of
the more realistic child characters I've seen in a
film. The simple, aching story of two sisters who
escape their fear for a sick mother with the help of a
set of spirits that only they can see is a perfect
example of how Miyazaki somehow constructs strong
dramatic pieces that avoid the simple black-and-white
"good guys" and "bad guys" of most films.
I had such a good time watching the film that I was
almost late leaving the Labs. FreeRide offered to
drive, and he's got a spiffy new hovercraft I have
been dying to ride in, so we headed out, managing to
make it from my place to the Four Seasons Hotel in
less than eight minutes. Several laws and windows may
have been broken en route, but so be it. As it was,
the interview before mine was running a bit late, so I
had a chance to speak with the lovely people from
Miramax who made this possible. I have this to say to
anyone who's worried that Miramax "doesn't get it," or
that they might not support the film enough; they get
it. They sounded just like me, still new to
Miyazaki's work, enchanted by it, still caught up in
the rush of having found it. They spoke about how he
once bought a WWII airplane that he flew across the
desert just to get a feel for it. They spoke in depth
about their reactions to key scenes from MONONOKE.
And unlike most publicist speak, this was real. They
think he's just as much of a rock star as I do.
There's a feeling, like you've just figured out a
secret, when you get turned on to his films, and I'm
hoping that the major push MONONOKE is about to get
will spur more Americans to get in on that secret. I
know TIME magazine is planning a major piece on the
film and Miyazaki's past work, and Roger Ebert is
definitely a convert. He sat down with the director
yesterday, and I can't wait to read about their chat.
When I entered the room where we'd be speaking, I was
introduced to Linda, Miyazaki's translator. As I got
settled in and went over my questions, I noticed there
was a camera crew setting up. Since I'm wanted in 47
countries, I'm not wild about being videotaped, so I
asked what was going on. The crew turned out to be
shooting a documentary on Miyazaki. I wasn't planning
to be on camera, and I would have worn my good glass
eye if I had known. Still, all concerns about my
appearance vanished when Miyazaki came into the room.
A man of medium build, he has a riveting gaze and an
easy smile, both of which he fixed on me as we were
introduced. We shook hands, took our seats, and dove
right in.
MORIARTY: Let's start today by talking about
flying. One of my personal pet peeves
in live action films is flying sequences.
They can't help it... they always look
fake. In your films, though, there's
a poetry to flight. There's the midnight
flight in TOTORO that feels like a warm-up
to KIKI. Is flight a long-time passion
of yours, and where does your sense of it
come from?
MIYAZAKI: Ever since I was a boy, I have always
liked airplanes. I've always been
interested in flying. This is one of the
questions I am often asked, and I can't
really explain why this is. For better or
for worse, there's no flight in MONONOKE,
so no one can say that all my characters
have to fly.
MORIARTY: Another hallmark of your work is the way
you treat your children characters. In
American films, both live-action and
animated, children are portrayed as small
adults, wise beyond their years. You
write children as they really are. You
capture each specific age. How do you
approach the writing of your young
characters?
MIYAZAKI: I've found that it's often true that when
you start making a film, you call on your
memories from that age. Your hopes from
that age, your desires from that age,
they're all resurrected. If you're
writing about someone who's 10, you have
to remember what that was like. As you
work on the film, though, I find that
imagination takes over.
MORIARTY: I was hoping you could talk a little bit
about one of the key collaborations of
your career, your work with composer Jo
Hisaishi. In particular, I was wondering
how you felt when Hisaishi recently
rescored your 1986 film LAPUTA: CASTLE IN
THE SKY. Are you happy with the new work?
This is when Miyazaki let loose with the first
instance of what I will call his "thinking noise."
It's a long, slow exhale, not quite a groan but
almost. I thought at first I had asked something
wrong, and I wondered how far the door was if I had to
bolt from embarrassment. Miyazaki took a long moment,
though, to really think about the question before
answering, his smile back and playing on his face as
he spoke.
MIYAZAKI: Jo Hisaishi and I have had a long term
collaboration, and whenever I start work
on a new film, I always go out and gather
CDs in an effort to find someone better to
write music for me. In the end, I always
have to crawl back to him when I realize
there is no one better.
I am not really an advocate of using wall-
to-wall music in a film. I like silence.
I can understand the anxiety for the
studio, though, and it was important to
them to add more music. None of it
matched, though, so [Hisaishi] ended up
recomposing and rerecording the whole
film. I've heard it, and it seems quite
lovely. I decided to allow it, but only
if Jo was going to allow it. When we work
on a film, we have meetings where we will
discuss it back and forth and decide where
the score goes. We will watch the film
and say, "Put some music here and here and
here," and when I am making my final edit,
I always want to pull some of it out.
"Cut it here and here and here." We have
had our share of fights. I decided to let
[Hisaishi] do whatever he chose with this
as a gift.
MORIARTY: I've read that you did an astonishing
amount of the work on MONONOKE yourself.
Of the film's 144,000 cels, you were said
to have pencilled 80,000 personally. Many
of KIKI's flying sequences were handdrawn
by you. As animators around the world
rush to embrace new digital tools, what
would you say to them about the place of
the artist in the process?
When the translator read Miyazaki the question, he
laughed, then shook his head.
MIYAZAKI: First, let me correct a misconception.
I did not draw 80,000 cels. I frequently
would correct or refine drawings to bring
them up to a certain standard of
excellence, but I didn't work on that many
from scratch. When you are making a film
like MONONOKE HIME, you create a standard
that all the artists must use. If you
have to, you redraw things to bring them
to that standard. I am fortunate enough
to work with many artists whose work is
already well beyond that standard, and I
do not have to do a thing to their work.
I would say that no matter what advances
are made in animation, the animator just
becomes more and more valuable. It's
imagination, and not technology, that is
most important.
MORIARTY: That would lead me to my next question.
With MONONOKE, you finally embraced the
use of certain CG elements in your
picture. Can you describe your experience
with these new tools?
MIYAZAKI: Originally, we decided to create a team
that would render the boar god from the
beginning of the film using CG. We wanted
that for the spirit snakes coming out of
him. We tried and we tried to do it that
way, but in the end we had to go back to
handdrawn for that scene. By that point,
we were already farther along in
developing some of the scenes, so we went
ahead and used the computer there. I wish
in some ways we had just done the whole
thing by hand.
The only reason we even put the boar scene
into the script was because we thought we
were going to be able to render it with
the computer. If I'd known how hard that
was going to be, I never would have said
yes to it. I suppose I have to say "thank
you" to the computer.
He couldn't contain his amusement at this concept, and
he worked to stop laughing as I asked my next
question.
MORIARTY: Lady Eboshi is hardly what I would call
a conventional villain in MONONOKE. In
fact, all your films seem to studiously
avoid black-and-white stereotypes about
good guys and bad guys. Is it important
to you to avoid villifying characters?
Once again, the thinking noise prefaced a long
silence. Miyazaki thought about it, then chose his
words very carefully, looking directly at me and
speaking with real conviction.
MIYAZAKI: A true villain -- someone who manages
to live with a hole where their heart
should be -- doesn't interest me in the
least. If they don't interest me, they
aren't going to show up in one of my
films.
I went to ask another question, but Miyazaki wasn't
finished. I could see he was still thinking about it,
and I waited until he spoke again.
MIYAZAKI: I haven't seen SILENCE OF THE LAMBS --
not all of it, anyway -- but I've read it,
and that villain
that's attractive. I find that very
interesting.
MORIARTY: In discussing MONONOKE with people, I've
heard some concern that the film might be
too spiritual, too historically distant,
too culturally removed for the average
American viewer to enjoy. What, if
anything, would you say to someone to
prepare them for the film?
MIYAZAKI: I guess they'll just have to see it.
If they don't like it or they don't
understand it, my words here aren't going
to help. I don't think I need to prepare
people, though. We as human beings have
more in common than we don't. We are, at
heart, the same. This film, it comes from
the same spirit as TOTORO. These films
come from the same place in me, and I
think they will speak to that same place
in other people as well.
MORIARTY: You spent well over a decade preparing
to make MONONOKE. You did pencil sketches
of San as early as 1980. Now that the
film is rolling out to audiences around
the world and you've had some time to live
with the film, are you satisfied? Is it
what you had hoped it would be?
Once again, the thinking sound. Miyazaki sized me up
as he considered the question. When he spoke, it was
so soft that I had to lean in to hear him.
MIYAZAKI: I can't answer that yet. I think we'll
have to wait at least 10 years before I
can know. We need to wait until all those
children who are just 10 now who are
seeing the film grow up, until they're 20
years old. We'll have to wait to see what
impact it has on them, on their
relationship with the world. To me, you
can't measure the success of a picture on
how many tickets it sells. You can only
measure it in how many hearts it changes.
As I made my notes, Miyazaki watched me, smiling.
MIYAZAKI: For someone who is on the Internet,
you write by hand quite fast. You write
a lot. It's like being a traditional
animator. You've got your computer, you
can do it that way, but still...
MORIARTY: I prefer this way, actually.
He just smiled, nodded, his eyes dancing. I got the
sign from the publicists that we had five minutes
left, so I flipped through the stack of questions I
brought. Many of you were kind enough to send me
suggestions, and I'm sorry if I didn't get to yours.
I appreciate the effort, and I'm just sad that the
time raced by as quickly as it did.
MORIARTY: The films of yours I've seen so far --
KIKI, TOTORO, and MONONOKE -- all take
place in real historical periods, or at
least identifiable ones. You've said that
KIKI takes place in a Europe where WWII
never happened. TOTORO is obviously set
in the early '50s. Even MONONOKE, which
feels like total fantasy, is set during
the Muromachi period of Japanese history.
Into these very real settings, you then
interject the magical, the fantastic.
How do you define these worlds for
yourself, and why the juxtoposition?
MIYAZAKI: Because otherwise it would be boring.
(laughs)
I always struggle about what age to set
a film in. For TOTORO, it was very
particular, very precise. I knew it had
to be set in 1953, when there was no TV
to intrude on the lives of children. It's
that last moment, when imagination is
still important, before 1955, when TV
arrived. For MONONOKE, I had to set it
then. The Kamakura period, the time right
before the Muromachi period, would have
been incomprehensible to modern viewers.
As far as KIKI is concerned...
(laughs again)
KIKI was the result of a bet I made
to someone. I bet that I could create
a world with both modern elements and
things from the past, and children would
never question it. Sadly, I won.
MORIARTY: And finally, sir, I would be remiss if I
didn't ask what we can expect in the 21st
Century from Hayao Miyazaki.
MIYAZAKI: All I know is that my next film will be
set in Japan, in a version of Japan where
fantasy and the modern world are
combined. Even here, even while I visit
with you, even while I travel, I lie awake
at night, moaning, worried about what
shape this film will take.
His translator added a sincere,
"He's not kidding,"
and that was that. I started to pack up, and the
translator noticed that I was carrying with me a copy
of the superb new Hyperion book PRINCESS MONONOKE: THE
ART AND MAKING OF JAPAN'S MOST POPULAR FILM OF ALL
TIME. It's a gorgeous hardback coffee table book,
loaded with exquisite art, filled with poetry that
Miyazaki wrote for his screenwriting collaborators as
well as Hisaishi, to guide him when scoring. I'm not
going to pretend I went in there without ulterior
motives, but I didn't want to ruin the mood by forcing
the book on him. Linda spared me the trouble, though.
"Is that for an autograph?"
"I'd be honored," I said.
"I think he had a good time. I think it's okay." She
took the book from me and offered it to Miyazaki. I
passed over a Sharpie, and watched, eyes agog, as he
drew me a quick sketch of Totoro and a dustbunny, then
signed his name and dated it.
He said something as she passed the book back over to
me, and she translated it.
"He says Totoro hasn't
gotten enough sleep. He looks wild."
I was so amazed
by the drawing that I barely remember the rest of the
process. I know we got up, said our good-byes, walked
out, somehow made our way to the car. I also know
that today was one of those rare, special moments
where you bask in the best of being a film geek. All
this useless clutter I've accumulated upstairs all
these years, these facts and box-office figures and
filmographies and credits and dialogue snippets, all
pay off on a day when I am invited to sit down with
someone like Miyazaki. Here's the Totoro drawing,
something special for you to share.
Hopefully that just whets your appetite for more of
the man's work. If so, find the MONONOKE book. It's
not just beautiful, it's also an exhaustive look at
the process of bringing this film to the screen, and
it's a real testament to that exhaustive detail work
that makes Studio Ghibli's films so unique. I know
that the book and today's interview and my morning
show of TOTORO have all made me rabid for September 30
to arrive. That's the day UCLA is kicking off their
special presentation, STUDIO GHIBLI: THE MAGIC OF
MIYAZAKI, TAKAHATA and KONDO. It runs through October
10, and promises a comprehensive look at the output of
Miyazaki, Isao Takahata, and Yoshifumi Kondo, with
screenings that include a sneak preview screening of
MONONOKE, Takahata's GRAVE OF THE FIREFLIES, and
Kondo's debut picture WHISPER OF THE HEART. As with
all UCLA Film and Television Archive programs, you can
call 310.206.FILM to get detailed information. You
should try and join me at the films mentioned above,
or NAUSICAÄ, ONLY YESTERDAY, CASTLE IN THE SKY, and
PORCO ROSSO. I plan to savor each and every moment.
|
