Story: This was like SO AMAZING I don’t even know how to explain it. EVERYTHING, and I mean EVERYTHING about this movie I absolutely LOVED. I only watched this movie because a friend of mine down the street told me Christian Bale first used the Batman voice in this movie. So he gave me the DVD and I looked at the cover… I was thinking “Ah this is gonna be 2 hours of suckishness”. But Hayao Miyazki (the director) proved me wrong! He’s like the freaking Japanese Walt Disney! This is based on a novel of the same name. It was made in Japanese but since John Lassetter, one of the creators of Pixar has a burning love for Miyazaki and all of his movies, he put one of Pixar’s directors, Pete Docter in charge of putting the English dub on. Anyways, this is full of creativity, one of the greatest stories I’ve ever seen told in a cartoon movie.
Visuals: Amazing. That’s all I can say. The transformations of Howl. Him oozing everywhere (sounds nasty, just ignore it till you watch the movie). The wicked with of the west’s young and old looks, along with Sophie’s. I wouldn’t change a thing about how this film looks.
Music: With everything else being sooooooo good, you wouldn’t expect the music to be fantasticly awesome too, would you? Well, just listen to the theme song then tell me if this didn’t deserve an A+.
Characters: Howl, Sophie, Turnip, Calcipher, the Wicked With Of The West, that little boy, everyone had a perfect amount of screentime and was well-developed.
Rewatch Value: I loved this movie so much I’m looking into watching some more Studio Ghibli and Hayao Miyazaki films. I’m also looking to buy Howl’s Moving Castle on DVD for my own library. The same friend who lent me Howl’s Moving Castle also has ‘Spirited Away’ which is considered Miyazki’s greatest film. My sister also has ‘My Neighbor Totoro’. So look forward to that review.
Retrospect Realm 