Credit: Studio GhibliA celebrated director has turned the entertainment world upside down with his announcement that he will not be retiring after releasing his next film.
There’s something so distinctly magical about the Hayao Miyazaki and Studio Ghibli films, including My Neighbor Totoro (1988), Princess Mononoke (1997), Spirited Away (2001), and Howl’s Moving Castle (2004). Although Miyazaki isn’t the only director under the Ghibli animation studio, he’s probably the most well-known due to the success and popularity of the films he’s worked on.
The Walt Disney Company would eventually collaborate with Studio Ghibli to distribute some of their films, bringing a wider audience to the Japanese animated films. The movies and Miyazaki specifically have cemented themselves within American culture over the last few years, especially in fandom-based spaces, and there’s even a theme park dedicated to the studio and its films located in Nagoya, Japan.
Miyazaki has planned to retire a few times over the last few decades, with the first announcement happening back in the ’90s, according to CNET. In 2013, he took his longest retirement yet, coming back to directing with what should have been his “final film.” The Boy and the Heron (2023) is about a boy named Mahito who loses his mother at a young age and has to learn how to deal with his grief. Like so many of Miyazaki’s films, The Boy and the Heron blurs the lines of reality and myth, and tells a captivating story about life, death, and how to deal with loss.
The film was released with almost no promotional or marketing effort other than being described as “Miyazaki’s final film,” and was released in Japan during July this year. It will be released internationally in December, but has already had the biggest opening of a film in Studio Ghibli history. It’s already being heralded as Miyazaki’s best film, but apparently, it will no longer be his last.
According to CBC, Ghibli executive Junichi Nishioka seemed to confirm that the acclaimed director has more ideas in him and is ready and willing to get back to work. “He is currently working on ideas for a new film,” Nishioka told a reporter on the Toronto International Film Festival red carpet. “He comes into his office every day and does that. This time, he’s not going to announce his retirement at all. He’s continuing working just as he has always done.”
It’s exciting news for fans, although perhaps not totally surprising. It’s a great way for both Miyazaki and Studio Ghibli to drum up some of their own hype for this film and any future ones from the director, especially with the success The Boy and the Heron is already seeing.
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