Miyazaki Reviews: Princess Mononoke

So, what do Miyazaki movie do I watch after Kiki's Delivery Service and Ponyo, arguable two of the most kid friendly Miyazaki films to date? None other than Princess Mononoke, the film Disney was too afraid to dub themselves so they gave it to Miramax to deal with. O_O Man, I've seen much gorier films, but compared to most of the cute miyazaki films out there, this one is pretty f'ed up. It has arrows shooting arms off, litteral Gods dying, and just gore all over the place, atleast compared to most miyazaki films like I said. This is definitely the most mature of his films so far. So, lets get into this animated Avatar, Princess Mononoke.

Princess Mononoke, while being the freakin title of the movie, is not quite our main character, and doesn't even show up until around halfway through the movie. No, we begin our story with a completely unrelated village with I guess our Local Town Love Interest (though its much more as if Mononoke herself is), Ashitaka. Ashitaka is an honorable warrior of a small village, when a giant demon boar...thing, comes around and starts attacking the city. He ends up killing the rabid beast but not without a little sacrifice. scratch that, pretty damn big sacrifice. He gets some demon on his arm, and instead of being like "you saved us hero, we will try to help you!" the elders are like "get outta here your stinkin our village ya demon-armed bastard." Ah Japanese honor culture...anyways, so he must get outta the village and find an ailment for his little morality tumor, seeing as if he doesn't soon, the thing will engulf his very flesh and he will die in a very gruesome and painful way. =)

So he sets off and on his way meets some raiders and "by accident" shoots their freakin heads off! I don't care how powerful a demon arm you got, is that even possible to shoot a person's skull clean off?! But then he meets Mr.Billy Bob Thorton himself and then is like "k thx bai" and goes on on his journey. Then we cut to completely randomsville on some cliff with people we don't know being commanded by Commander Bitch we don't know. I don't remember her name so I'm just gonna call her that. Anyways, they try to kill some giant ass wolves with apparently prototypes of cannons and guns... I'm not my most up-and-up on my Japanese folklore, but would they have firearms back then? Even if it is prototypes?... But anyways they don't catch em and a couple guys fall to their deaths and Commander Bitch is like "they dead anyways KEEP MOVIN YOU SWINES." and they keep movin them swines.
Back to Mr. Protagonist guy, still journeying on, he sees a couple of the guys who fell, who somehow survived. So being the goody-two shoes he is, He helps the two out and try to bring them back home. They get their to Iron Town, a secluded area near forests where spirits live, and have all the women be all independent and jobbed and stuff and they all make iron and weaponry and things. So then he meets Lady Bitch and she explains how there's a wolf lady who thinks she's a wolf spirit and wants to kill her because Lady Bitch is screwing around with the forest and wants to get rid of the Gods, and Mr. Demon Arm tells his story for the upteenth time in the movie. Seriously just about everyone he meets he tells the same damn cursed arm thing. Then Ms. Wolf Lady herself drops by and almost gets her, and meets Mr. Dreamboat and leaves. Then he's like "NO BITCH I'M LEAVIN." and leaves Iron Town to see Ms. Furry Dream. He then tells his story AGAIN, and she's like "screw you bitch,"

Then A bunch of other crap I don't even remember happens and it ends up Mr. Billy Bob returns because he's a bounty hunter of some kind who wants the freakin Forest God's head for the Emperor. so Lady Bitch and Billy Bob team up to behead that son of a tree that would most certainly destroy the entire ecosystem but they try to do it anyway. So then all the gods go off to start a war with the humans to stop their forest destruction. And Mr. Protagonist is desperately trying to keep the peace against these two. But alas, it doesn't work and Lady Bitch and Billy Bob manage to shoot the Forest Spirit's head off. But seeing as he's The God and that wouldn't freaking kill him, he gets all angry and chases them for his head. Billy Bob then is forced to give back the freakin head before the entire forest is destroyed, him along with it. Then Protagonist saves Lady Bitch and they all live in peace happily ever after...except the fact that Mononoke still has to be in the forest and he can't. So true love doesn't really conquer all quite in this film.

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And so that's Princess Mononoke, an actually good and gory Avatar. It also actually became the number one grossing film in Japan....until Titanic came out 4 months later. =/ But it is an amazing film with lots of action, storytelling and definitely visuals. Though it can get pretty damn confusing and slowpaced. Hence while I pretty much remembered most of Ponyo and Kiki, this movie I forget most of the middle part. So if you really wanna know what happens in the middle, or wanna see anything really, Go see it. You won't regret it. Now to get into a giant flying castle thing...that doesn't move.

Next Time, Castle in The Sky