Howl's Moving Castle(2004) __EXCLUSIVE__
Sophie, a young milliner and eldest of three sisters, encounters a wizard named Howl on her way to visit her sister Lettie. Upon returning home, she meets the Witch of the Waste, who transforms her into a 90-year-old woman. Seeking to break the curse, Sophie leaves home and sets off through the countryside. She meets a living scarecrow, whom she calls "Turnip Head". He leads her to Howl's moving castle where she enters without invitation. She subsequently meets Howl's young apprentice Markl and a fire demon named Calcifer, the source of the castle's magic and movement. Calcifer makes a deal with Sophie, agreeing to break her curse if she breaks his link with Howl. When Howl appears, Sophie announces that she has "hired herself" as a cleaning lady.
Howl's Moving Castle(2004)
In September 2001, Studio Ghibli announced the production of two films. The first would become The Cat Returns and the second was an adaptation of Diana Wynne Jones' novel, Howl's Moving Castle.[21] A rumor persists that Miyazaki had an idea to do Howl's Moving Castle during a visit to Strasbourg Christmas market.[21] Toshio Suzuki, who produced Howl's Moving Castle, stated that Miyazaki was inspired to make the film when he read Jones' novel, and was struck by the image of a castle moving around the countryside.[22] The novel does not explain how the castle moved, and Miyazaki was interested in figuring out how the castle might move, which led to the image of a castle on chicken legs.[15] The complex moving castle changes and rearranges itself several times throughout the movie in response to Howl's eccentricity and the various situations.[21] The basic structure of the castle consists of more than 80 elements including turrets, a wagging tongue, cogwheels and chicken legs, that were rendered as digital objects.[21]
Miyazaki went to Colmar and Riquewihr in Alsace, France, to study the architecture and the surroundings for the setting of the film.[21] Additional inspiration came from the concepts of future technology in Albert Robida's work.[21] Commentators have stated that Miyazaki's imagery was influenced by his fondness for the "illusion art" of 19th century Europe.[24] Suzuki stated that unlike many Western films, in which the imagery went "from the general [to] the specific,"[15] Miyazaki employed a uniquely Japanese approach, frequently beginning with a very specific image and moving from there.[15] However, Howl's Moving Castle, and Miyazaki films in general, have a focus on realistic imagery in a way that other anime films do not.[15]
Sophie (voiced by Emily Mortimer in the English version) is a young girl, who works as a hatter in a small town store. When the feared Witch of the Waste inflicts a powerful curse which prematurely ages Sophie into a withered old woman, as penance for her dalliance with the wizard Howl (Christian Bale), her quiet life is thrown into disarray. With the inability to explain her curs, she leaves the hat shop to scours the wastes to search for a solution, where a chance encounter with the moving castle - a steam punk inspired contraption, and its magical occupants changes her life forever.
On a few occasions, I noticed a slight juddering effect on moving figures, but this was fleeting and a reflection on the production rather than any fault of the transfer. There seems to be a slight amount of telecine wobble, but will only be visible on a larger display with a fair amount of scrutiny.
Not long after Sophie arrives at his moving castle, Howl quickly senses that she has something in her pocket, secretly planted there by the Witch of the Waste. It's a small piece of paper with some kind of spell written on it, and Howl reads it aloud.
Along the way, Sophie meets upon the hill the scarecrow Turnip Head. She passes the mysterious moving castle and enters it. At this point, she meets the enchanted fire demon named Calcifer, who powers the castle and recognizes that Sophie has been cursed. Calcifer offers to break the curse in exchange for Sophie's help in breaking the spell he's under, which keeps Calcifer bound to the house. She also meets Howl's young apprentice Markl.
Using her magic ring, Sophie makes her way toward Howl's heart, and enters through the door into Howl's childhood. She stumbles into his old cottage and looks upon his old things. Outside the marshlands, she sees dozens of falling stars vanish as they land on the earth. She then sees Howl and Calcifer meet: Howl eats Calcifer, who gains his heart. Sophie finds Howl, having now lost his human consciousness in bird form. They head back to the group, and Sophie asks the Witch for Howl's heart. She gives it to her and places the heart back in Howl, resurrecting him and freeing Calcifer. She kisses the scarecrow who reveals that he is actually the missing prince. Heen shows the scene of their happy end to Suliman, and the war is finally over. Howl, Sophie, and the others return home from the end of the war, flying high above the bomber planes in a moving house.
Much of the flapping-type flight machines widely used throughout the film were inspired by 19th century French artist Alberta Robida's work. Several types of these flapping-type warships operated in both kingdoms and its neighboring territories. Large aerial bombers are used in fleet combat and are seen bombing cities as well. Neighboring countries also operated massive fixed-wing bombers. The propulsion for these warships, such as the flying battleship is mainly covered by small moving wings fixed on the ship's hull, while propeller engines are hardly used. Many of the massive airships seen are also mainly used for military and not civilian use.
In HOWL'S MOVING CASTLE, Howl (voiced by Takuya Kimura in the original version and Christian Bale in the English dub) is a wizard who's had his heart stolen by a demon. His efforts to recover himself include assembling a ragtag "family" to live with him in his moving castle. These include a friendly fire demon named Calcifer (Tatsuya Gashuin/Billy Crystal) and young apprentice Markl (Ryūnosuke Kamiki/Josh Hutcherson). The newest member is Sophie (Chieko Baisho/Jean Simmons), a 90-year-old housekeeper who's really an 18-year-old hat-maker (Chieko Baisho/Emily Mortimer), cursed by the large and lumpy Witch of the Waste (Akihiro Miwa/Lauren Bacall) so that she can't tell anyone that she's been transformed. Sophie has been led to the castle by a hopping, turnip-headed scarecrow. And here she finds not only acceptance but also a crew in need of care.
Perhaps not as vast as Spirited Away, this film film offers an equally imaginative film world. The moving castle itself acted as another character with the film doing a great job at depicting all of its intricacies. The level of animation was excellent all around, offering plenty of color and detail with its characters and environments. The voice acting was great all around with every character having moments.
The movie of howls moving castle is sadly not one of the examples of the movie being better or equally as good as the book. The princess bride is, howeverSee that movieOnly read the book of howls moving castle
mehhh... you can't blame for not liking fantasy fiction. i've never watched lotr or something and i'll never do it. but as an english language & literature student, i have to take that course. so you ask, why did you even choose EL&L? the answer is simple: i couldn't do translation or be a teacher. i love english. i just want teachers to let us read what we want. if they don't, they should wait for us to tell OUR ideas of the book. for example, i hate howl's moving castle -even the name is stupid i think- and i want to write some bad things in the exam, which is impossible. this is unfair i think. look what happened in the last course. this is fantasy fiction course, and we're supposed to read both howl's moving castla and the hobbit, and the teacher asked a question about lotr. if you know, you'll get 20+ points for the exam. WHAT. THE. HELL. MAN. The hobbit =/= LOTR. Okay, maybe The Hobbit was written before lotr but i'm not supposed to read the trilogy, am i? i even hardly read the hobbit!anyway, back to the subject. as i said i don't like hmc. and i wanted to watch the anime. actually i'm not much into the animes, but maybe if i watch hmc the anime version, i could fall in love with howl and like the book A BIT. yeah, you understand my anime dislike. there are always mary-sues like sophie in the animes, even in miyazaki'S. i like the cool man, but i CAN'T watch animes.as for the sophie in the book, i still think she's annoying. i can't define my favorite type of girl. anyway. the problem is, the anime is completely different from the book! omfg what am i going to do?! i don't want to read the damn book!!!sorry, my comment seemed relevant and rude, but i'm not a rude person. as you see, i just hate being made to read something which i strongly detest. i'm a rebel, and i don't want people to order me. wish i could change the system. but this is impossible lol.
i grew up on the book. its hands down my favourite book of all time. I was so excited when I heard there was a movie coming out. I went and saw it with my mum (who read the book to me when I was little) I was so angry I nearly cried after I saw the movie. some things just shouldn't be tampered with and howl's moving castle is one of them. I can understand having to cut bits out for the sake of time in converting a book into movie but this was all over the place from blob men to changing the actual villain. and to top it off the magical flower field howl made for Sophie was so under-whelming and where was the flower shop? most of the hilarious parts were cut. the movie kills me. if I try to see it as a completely different story I can watch it and almost enjoy it. but mostly I just get mad. sorry but its true
Points I disagree on...MAJOR CHANGE #2: Howl Loves War, Not GirlsThis should rather be read as: Why is there a war concept here? Because Miyazaki wanted to add an anti-war commentary (if I remember correctly, in the year the film was released there's an ongoing "military operation" America is conducting). Completely unnecessary, I have to admit. Movie Howl DOES NOT LOVE WAR, he is against it. Why is he then plunging head on in the midst of battle? To prevent even more collateral damage. He is, in a sense, putting himself in-between opposing forces to disarm both parties. This act makes him naive, though, since we all know that he's hardly making any progress as the task he set to do is much larger than he could possibly handle but he couldn't just stand there and do nothing.MAJOR CHANGE #5: The Big Bad Now Loves Mob CapsI get your point, this is a massive change. This is another Miyazaki's signature on his works -- making villains more like antagonists. The Book's Witch of the Waste IS the BIG BAD, agreed (if I remember correctly, her "fire demon" took over her body). But in the film adaptation, there is no big bad: The Witch of the Waste is a victim herself of her own obsession. On the other hand, Suliman "orchestrated" the war as a means to locate Howl (the main purpose why the Castle is moving from place to place in the first place), since Howl would be obligated to appear before the king should the need for his services arises. Amidst the destruction that happened, no one (not even background characters) died in the commotion. Why is she adamant at locating Howl and capturing him? Because she wanted to help him overcome his curse, as she fears that Howl may end up not recovering his human form in the long run, Her attempt to strike him indicates that should she fail in curing him, she may as well take some drastic actions since she was the one who had taught him magic.Like the author of this article, I, too, found about Diana Wynne-Jones novels through this anime movie. Through it, I fell in love with the characters. Through the novels, I ended up loving them more. 041b061a72