3D animation is the future of the animation industry and this is apparent with the number of 3D films being released yearly. But this does not mean that we should forget the virtues of 2D. One of the firm keepers of the legacy of 2D animation is none other than the celebrated Japanese animator Hayao Miyazaki.
Miyazaki is widely regarded as the Walt Disney of Japan. It could be the other way around and we wouldn’t mind. Before you think that this title is mere hyping only, refer to his latest theatrical release: Ponyo on the Cliff by the Sea. All 170,000 frames in this film are hand-drawn. Here is the trailer:
“The world might be going toward high tech, but I would like to have Studio Ghibli (his animation studio) to be like a wooden boat that journeys with sails. Of course, we can sink. I don’t know if we’re very strong, and we’re not confident about the future.” Miyazaki told said through a translator.
Wine gets better with age and so is 2D hand-drawn animation for Miyazaki. He has been a consistent force in ensuring that 2D animation remains of top-notch quality in Japan. He first came into the fore of Western animation attention in 1997 when he created Princess Mononoke. This was the first animated film to win Picture of the Year at the Japanese Academy Awards. It was even the highest grossing film of its time until Titanic smashed box office records.
Miyazaki proved to be no one hit wonder after this success. He returned to give us more such as Spirited Away, which is the first anime film to win the Academy Award. This was also followed with the nomination for the film Howl’s Moving Castle.
Miyazaki’s latest Ponyo is a variation of the popular Little Mermaid story. There are no mermaids here, just a goldfish who badly wanted to become a little girl after she became friends with the 5 year old boy Sosuke.
You’d think this is just a simple tale rendered in hand-drawn illustrations and colors. But Miyazaki is always careful to infuse environmental awareness in his works. In Ponyo, he presents us with different forms of life which we think are already extinct and sews the narrative to become an advocacy to protect the environment.
“I saw how people have polluted the sea, and came back home really angry and irritated,” says Miyazaki, referring to his experience of seeing the coast of the Seto Inland Sea in Japan as polluted.
The Walt Disney comparisons also don’t stop as a mere compliment. The two camps actually have good interactions together. Disney Chief Creative Officer John Lasseter, a key proponent of 2D animation as well with the upcoming The Princess and the Frog, expressed his admiration of Miyazaki’s work by visiting Studio Ghibli. The two animation icons talked about giving more exposure to Ponyo in the United States.
Even if Miyazaki only reached Western prominence in the late 1990s, he has an accomplished track record dating back to the 1980s. He won the Animage Anime Grand Prix awards for the following titles: Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind in 1984, Castle in the Sky in 1986, My Neighbor Totoro in 1988, and Kiki’s Delivery Service in 1989.
Miyazaki is always hands-on with every project, often serving as its writer and director. His characters are complex individuals as well with depth not expected in cartoons. Because of his influence in the animation industry not only in Japan but for the whole world, Miyazaki was recognized as one of the most influential Asians of the past 60 years in 2006.
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