Ponyo is… in one word, random.  At least the first time you’ve seen it.  In the beginning I found myself thinking, wow… this movie has so much potential, it’s surely a must-see masterpiece.  I love it already.  But through the middle and ending it’s a painstaking struggle of trying to piece together the Hayao fantasy reality.  Be it the naivety of a first viewing, poor translation, or failure of the voice cast to fully convey the point, I was left with so many unanswered questions. In the end, I felt that it was a “kind of good” movie thrown together with interesting artistic bits, Miyazaki’s common trademarks, and maybe a huge dose of “Americanized.”  I emphasize, lots of unanswered questions.  Seeing that it’s got good reviews, I must have missed something.

One  big discrepancy that nagged at me throughout the movie was the pronunciation of the boy’s name.  It varies from Satsuke to Sosuke and versions in between.  So did the pronunciation of Ponyo, but that’s a little harder to get wrong.  Yes, I was sorely disappointed at the choice of voice cast, which weren’t Japanese in the slightest for every dialogue.  But then come on, did they have to use big names like Matt Damon, Tina Fey, Cate Blanchett??  The fame of these POIGNANT AMERICAN cast members even further undermines the authenticness of the characters, atrociously detaching it from its Japanese origin and intended meaning.  What’s the point of using famous Americans to voice your anime?  Because you can?  Well, it was probably as painful a choice as the Disney re-issuing of Totoro on DVD.  If you’ve seen the wonderful old VHS version compared to the newer Disneyified movie, you might have an idea of the horrific devestation done by Dakota and Elle Fanning who, among other Big Name Americans, wreaked havoc on the core soul of the film.  The newer version is absolutely no good.  As a Japanese reviewer said, “With no disrespect meant to the American voice actors who dub the films into English, the native Japanese voice work is simply superior in every way.“

I would really like to get a hold of the Japanese subtitled Ponyo.  I strongly feel that lots of the movie’s meaning must have been lost through the poor dialogue.  In some of the scenes you think to yourself that the translation must have been either badly worded or badly vocalized.  It’s a loss of subtle cultural nuances, accurate anime expressiveness, and failure of the explanatory monologues to do their explaining.

Tor.com says- “The English script produced by Kathleen Kennedy and Frank Marshall is reportedly less faithful than usual to the Japanese original, in an effort to make the film more marketable for U.S. audiences.”  This is way disappointing.

The unexplained heart of the movie – spoiler discussion

I like how this review from Canada.com put it:

“The story is simple in the same way that dreams are simple; that is, it follows its own logic except when it’s more convenient to make up new rules on the fly. Why, for instance, does the moon suddenly move closer to the Earth at the film’s midway point? What’s with the impromptu discussion of breastfeeding between two five-year-olds and their grown-up neighbour, in the middle of a flash flood?”

Being that Ponyo will turn into sea foam if Sasuke doesn’t love her, it’s gotta be a Ghibli retelling of the traditional little mermaid story.  But it’s really quite different with the mix of random flavors thrown in: remember the wall of water  from the moon with the wall of ships (??); the feminine man of a dad who mysteriously has one special big daughter and lots of small unimportant ones; the completely unexplained well in his basement: “if even one living creature gets in here…“; what exactly happened when ponyo let the fish into that well (golden fish came out and caused a tsunami?); how come dinosaur-aged fish suddenly came out of nowhere?  And, why did ponyo turn back into a chicken-fish at the end when Sosuke was running through the tunnel?  Did the womanly ocean father even succeed in reinstating the Age of Fish?

Many pining questions, answers are appreciated!

A British review explains:

“All of Miyazaki’s films have their own blithe disregard for narrative logic, but Ponyo is as chaotic and exuberant as a story told by a hyperactive toddler who has just been mainlining Fruit Shoots (…and then a whale did come and it did turn into a wave. And then they did eat noodles…). The rich symbolism and the shadowy frisson of threat in, say, Spirited Away is more or less absent from this film. There is a creepy underwater sorcerer who tries to keep Ponyo the goldfish in his underwater lair, but the sum total of his evil-doing is an injudicious over-application of blue eye shadow and the fact that he once shoots his bubble gun at a passing squid.”

After writing my review and reading others, I conclude that Ponyo must have been trying to be as simple and enjoyable as Totoro, which also had a few unanswered questions (why is there a cat bus in the mountains?).  But with the obstacle of our very own American voice crew and high expectations along the lines of Princess Mononoke and Spirited Away rather than another toddler movie, a viewer can easily be left disappointed and confused.

Rotten tomatoes gave this a 95% — my brother says a first grader must have been writing all the reviews.

Things I did like about the movie:

  • Miyazaki’s environmentalist references to ocean pollution and its destruction, a recurring theme often pitted against Ghibli’s unique vehicles/machinery
  • Ponyo’s unbelievable cuteness
  • The mom’s reference to Totoro when she sings, “we’re as happy as can be!”
    Original song here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KGH5shJjl9g
  • Stunning animation and creative sea effects, beautiful hand-drawn everything

All that being said, I would still recommend you see it sometime if you haven’t yet–it’s a beautiful, very cute work of art.  But try to get a hold of the Japanese version if possible!