This is not directed by Hayao Miyazaki, but it’s truly a Ghibli flavor work with a lot of love and color in the movie.

Arrietty is directed by a member of Ghibli, Hiromasa Yonebayashi with story planned by Hayao Miyazaki and the producer, Toshio Suzuki.

Some works of Studio Ghibli, such as Spirited Away, Princess Mononoke, or Ponyo in the Cliff, were also carried into American theaters, however, Arrietty would be the biggest theater promotion ever for Studio Ghibli.

Actually, Hayao Miyazaki says that overseas success is a kind of bonus for them because Ghibli firstly didn’t expect any success or worldwide fans in the world.  In that sense, no matter how the theater numbers are more or less, Hayao Miyazaki would be pleased with the fact of this release.

Animation environment is not so easy for workers of production in Japan.  To live, they need constant success in Japan first of all.  Studio Ghibli is no exception.  But the hard competition in the animation market of Japan consequently grows the quality of works and real animators.  Under less competition,  it’s surely impossible to keep such high level of entertainment.

Fans in Japan also know that.  We fans don’t care much if the works of Japan are successful in other countries.  It’s a pleasure if world fans know the works of Japan.  Moreover, we would be pleased if animators give us better things than we’ve ever enjoyed.

Anyway, I hope Studio Ghibli would keep on producing that high quality job enough to bring us more joy.

Hatsune Miku is already a well known anime character in Japan and in the world of anime fans.  It’s natural for anime fans that characters should have reality and fans often think  as if the characters are alive in this real world.

That desire is already realized in the concerts.  Some many know it but for anime beginners it could be a hard thing to understand.

Japanese people like to bring any kind of dreams into being, with the endless efforts, the engineers and animators again did such a great job.

They finally brought the anime characters into real world.  Characters sing and dance in the concerts, which was not rare in the past either, but this time they look like real human with complete 3D figure.  Faces changes along with emotion, and detail expression like hairs, fingers, foot steps, eyes blinks, and natural looking body moves impress us just like we are enjoying their concerts in the real world.

This concerts were already carried out in 2010, however, the rumors of this concerts never fade away from fans topics.  Some say Miku and Luka should have shows in the 2012 Olympic games in London, which is not a joke but fan’s serious request.

Just one look at the show, like it or not, this instantly takes your attention and after all you would be surprised with the quality of the show.  I, too, was amazingly impressed with this show, and I could not move from the screen for views by repeating many times.

Also about the music of Hatsune Miku or Megurine Luka is made by using Vocaloid machine, which was invented by Japanese music instruments company called Yamaha. Through Vocaloid, no singers for the CD is required. The voice is made by synthesizing the computer sound, however, the “voice” really matches well with the animation characters.

Actually, the CDs of Hatsune Miku were accepted all over the world, not only in Japan. This new production can easily go over the language barrier that used to exist when the real human voice was recorded.

As this way, the singers are sold through CDs, online download, and ” real concerts ” of 3D characters.

Today’s topic is about Studio Ghibli Museum in Mitaka city, Tokyo. Some or many should know that this is the top animator of Japan, Hayao Miyazaki’s museum, and he also often work inside here.  When guests from the world come to see him, they are often invited into this museum for coffee tolk with Hayao Miyazaki ( what a lovely experience !).

In this studio, we can see many tear dropping animation characters like the robot ( see photo ) played in the Castle in the Sky, Cat bus and big Totoro doll in the movie, TOTORO.

Also probably it’s still playing short animation for visitors, even it’s short, many who saw it say it’s wonderful as always.

If you are a fan of Hayao Miyazaki films, it’s a good choice to visit while your trip in Japan.

Museum house is rather big as Japanese houses go,  yet it’s maybe small for visitors from the USA or such big countries.  Japan has small space only.

It’s often crowded on weekend. If possible it’s better for you going on weekdays.  It’s in Mitaka city in Tokyo, but actually it takes 1 hour or so to get there bu using train and walking from the train station if you come from center of Tokyo.

For ticket information or access, please see  http://www.ghibli-museum.jp/en

Enjoy your trip !

Hayao Miyazaki don’t often have interviews but this interview is a very long one and his vision is ver clear here.

Especially at the beginning he answers about the civilization of the world. Reaction of the audience is interesting, too.

His comment about the films and the world we live is really fantastic in thinking about what the human really is.

It’s an interview with Hayao Miyazaki a few years ago and recently it’s updated on YouTube but please enjoy it when you have time.

Recently many animation directors newly appear in Japan. Among them, Makoto Shinkai should be the top renowned artist in making quality animation and creating touching story.

5 centimerters per second was made several years ago, but still the quality of the animation can’t be topped by the others.

As we all know, there is a world renowned master film maker, Hayao Miyazaki, in Japan.  He is still active and his status would not change forever here in Japan.  Meanwhile,  Makoto Shinkai’s approach to animation drawing is totally fresh in Japanese animation works.

At the first look at his work, we notice the ultimate beauty in his animation.  It’s often like a picture but human production taste is beautifully added in the animation. After all, the works we see in his films are just like we are floating in the virtual reality world.

In addition, his story telling in the films is really touching. Sometimes it’s so sad but the story also gives us a sense of reality because many of us certainly experience the similar things through our life.

Realism of both in animation works and story making set us in the virtual reality world that we seem to have experienced.

Especially for younger generation in Japan, Makoto Shinkai is now a new hero in animation.  It’s true that he developed a new world that we never knew before.

Below is the promotion video of 5cm per Second. Please see the quality of the new talent.

I’m a huge fan of Hayao Miyazaki.  For many reasons, there are many of his works that don’t leave from my heart for a long time.

Among them, the music is also splendid.  Most of the songs of Miyazaki movies are composed by Joe Hisaishi.  He is a nationally beloved musician in Japan, and we all are moved by his works. We can’t tell exactly why, but it’s true that his sound and melody touches our soul in the deeper places.

Among his songs of Miyazaki Movies, I can list up many masterpieces like Princess Mononoke ( Ashitaka Sekki), Nausicaa of the Valley of the winds, and probably we can’t forget the songs from Spirited away and Howl’s moving Castle.

For me, if I needed to choose one song from them, I would probably select a song from Castle in the Sky.  This song is called KIMIWO NOSETE in Japanese, maybe the close English translation is like Carrying You.

This song is sung by an unknown singer then, but later this song remained as a top popular song of animation movies in Japan. Then she, the singer, also gradually became famous.  Her main job is conveying this song to the next generation by her beautiful voice.  She continued her job at My Neighbour Totoro.  W can hear her nice voice again in the movie.

Anyway, this song, Kimiwo Nosete, is a real masterpiece with such a pure voice and unforgettable melody.  Later this song was picked up as an elementaly school’s and junior high school’s music textbook song, so younger generation of Japanese people know this song well because they sing it at schools.

I like it very much. When I hear it, I remember when I was really young and when I was looking for my dream with a heart of young boy.

Of course Hayao Miyazaki can work any time, whenever he wants to. He is a national treasure of Japan. Nobody stops him if he wants to produce a movie.

Putting aside that fact, I recently worry about his future.  He is nearly 70 years old.  Being that age, making a movie with enough passion and physical energy is really hard.

I saw Ponyo on the Cliff some months ago. Apparently he made it for children, not for any adults.  This is a really first approach he made.  In his movies, children were included in the expected viewers, but on Ponyo, he intensionally targetted only kids and maybe he dared not to think about adults for the kid movie.

His movies always had high motive each time.  That’s why he changed the world of animation.  He put his thoughts into the movie of animation even in the family movie, My neighbor TOTORO. That was, in other words, his challenge to the society with animated expression.

But I thought he didn’t challenge this time in Ponyo on the Cliff.  He probably tried to show the BEST world to children.

People often become soft and round when they feel the time of maturity.  If Hayao Miyazaki thinks like that, Ponyo on the Cliff could be the proof of his stage of the ending.

I hope my idea is wrong and he would once again come back to the challenging animation world.  I love his works.  So when I think of him recently, I maybe worry too much about this blank time until his next work coming up.

Please Make It Again, Miyazaki !

Jean Simmons died today.

She did the great voice over work on Howl’s Moving Castle by Hayao Miyazaki. She was also a good actress pf London, UK.

In Howl’s Moving Castle, she did an excellent job for the leading role, Sophie, when Sophie became an old woman.

I first saw this movie in New Zealand in English language, so the image of this leading role is still synchronized with her voice.

Thank you very much, Jean Simmons.

Coming February 6th, the Doraemon Film Festival will be held at Jimbocho Theater until 26th of February.

This probably will be the first Doraemon Film festival in Tokyo.

As a surprising news, the advanced selling tickets are all sold out until today. This means Doraemon still has amazing popularity among Japanese anime or manga fans. News says the ticket buyers are in wide range of ages, and the high aged people, such as 40′s or 50′s, are also trying to buy tickets of Doraemon films.

Actually, Doraemon raised a lot of modern people of Japan and the fans are still enjoying Doraemon by DVD or comic books.

This festival might be repeated annually if this inaugural one becomes successful.

Maybe Saint Seiya is the most popular doll ( or figure ) among animation series now. Ths artistic color and shape is the complete charm of real animation characters.

Saint Seiya animation series have many type of figures, but the quality of them are high.

Figure of Saint Seiya

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