I never really tried to look into the aesthetics of a movie before, always just went along for the ride to see what happened from start to end. I don’t consider myself to be an artsy person either so I doubly thought I couldn’t analyze a film very well. However after reading some of Roger Ebert’s how to read a movie though I discovered there’s some very simple tells that even I could follow.

The movie I decided to break down is Hayao Miyazaki’s animated feature Howl’s Moving Castle. Here is the IMDB summary: When an unconfident young woman is cursed with an old body by a spiteful witch, her only chance of breaking the spell lies with a self-indulgent yet insecure young wizard and his companions in his legged, walking home.

The aforementioned young woman, Sophie,  is a very self-conscious character. Sophie sincerely believes that she is not a beautiful person and this is emphasized in her life by her very dull and plain clothes befitting an old woman. In her home life Sophie’s family also unknowingly belittle her, her sister although trying to help her gain confidence actually ends up showing Sophie the gap between them by showing how much more friendly the people treat her compared to Sophie. While the mother gallivants around with male suitors in fancy dress and emphasizing her confidence in her looks.When Sophie is changed into an old woman though, she starts to think that this is how it should be staying a quiet old woman who just blends into the background not making a stir. However despite not having confidence in herself Sophie actually has many talents in cooking, cleaning and sewing she even interacts with people well if she doesn’t think too much about it.

The other protagonist, Howl, is a powerful wizard who is know far and wide for his walking castle and seductiveness to the extent that people believe he literally steals the hearts of beautiful women. However the beauty he exudes is more of a facade so that people don’t discover the ugliness in him. Something I noticed that proves this is that whenever Howl enters a room with other people in it his face is constantly hidden, often looking towards the ground in dismay. Despite being an extremely powerful wizard Howl is actually a coward, constantly running away from his problems.

Basically the entire dilemmas both characters feel can be seen in this scene, personally Sophie’s declaration always struck a cord to me:

An interesting feature I read about in Robert Ebert’s article was the screen orientation, how certain angles and directions signify the atmosphere of the story. After reading about this I started looking out for cues and did manage to find some examples. When Sophie discovers she has been turned into an old woman she frantically begins to pace back and forth, when focusing on the negative aspects of being cursed she is moving towards the left which Ebert states can signify misery and despair. And when shes consoling herself by saying to calm down she begins to move to the right, which is a positive aspect. As shown in this clip:

Another example of the screen orientation I saw was for Howl’s castle, throughout the film it is always moving to the left which Ebert may also state as Howl embracing the past rather than facing his future showing how much of a coward he really is.

The scenery in this movie was also significant as well, although for the most part the land is beautiful and untouched the sky is clouded with a black smog which could indicate the condition of the world is not good. This observation is shown again when you see the condition of Howl’s castle being a filthy disgusting place that hardly befitting the image of a castle.

Overall I think this is a wonderful movie that shows very strong characters one can get emotionally attached to. As for a recent example to compare it to another the most recent film Miyazaki had a hand in creating is The Secret World of Arrietty, I haven’t seen this movie but most Studio Ghibli films tend to be pretty similar in aesthetics so could be continuing the positive aspects of Howl’s Moving Castle.