PoeticBy John DeSando, WCBE's "It's Movie Time," "Cinema Classics," and "On the Marquee"
"I have heard the mermaids singing each to each.
I do not think that they will sing to me." T.S. Eliot's Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock.
For Sosuke, they sing loud and clear.
Because I never much cared for the sweetness of Disney's Little Mermaid, I was prepared for a sugar overload in Ponyo, a Japanese anime from acclaimed director Hayao Miyazaki. Then I remembered how genuinely adorable his Princess Mononke is and how creative Howl's Moving Castle.
In short, I was pleased with the startlingly imaginative animation in his Ponyo, with a roiling dark sea befitting Homer and flat characters that yet jump out of the screen with affection for each other and expressions both wildly off center and yet perfectly tuned to their love of nature and each other. The vivid colors add both depth to characterization and vitality to nature.
The plot?it amuses me, as it did with Wall-E and Eve, to have either children or robots expressing a purity of love we usually express only in poetry or song lyrics. Yes, Sosuke is just five, and his undersea love, Ponyo, is probably younger. Yet their love and respect for each other is exhilarating,
Oh, yes, plot: in the best mythopoetic tradition, she wants to become human, much to the displeasure of her Prospero-like father but supported by her larger than life fairy mother, Gran Mamere. Sosuke's mother, Lisa, is an energetic do-gooder whose love for her son is memorable.
While Dad seems conflicted about his powers and his affection for his many fish/children, the film has a way of making you see that this is the way many fathers are about their children. Such is Miyazaki's approach to imagination and reality?they co-exist in a mythical world of challenge, contradiction, and conciliation.
You can guess what happens, but not after some cool storms.
John DeSando teaches film at Franklin University and co-hosts WCBE 90.5's It's Movie Time, Cinema Classics, and On the Marquee, which can be heard streaming at http://publicbroadcasting.net/wcbe/ppr/index.shtml and on demand at http://www.publicbroadcasting.net/wcbe/arts.artsmain Contact him at JDeSando@Columbus.RR.com