It's a glimpse of Ghibli's future that ought to reassure anyone who cares about animation.
He hasn't made a poetic film in the manner of his Ghibli mentors, but it's actually more polished in some ways than much of their work, especially in terms of movement.
STUDIO GHIBLI THE CAT RETURNS MOVIE
This movie exhibits a craft that belies Morita's inexperience as a director. The surreal feel escalates once Haru, the Baron and Muta flee into the royal maze and doesn't stop until a final, seemingly never-ending scream before the denouement. It's no surprise that the original Japanese voice actress for Haru, Chizuru Ikewaki, felt as though she spent most of the movie yelling.ĭarn,+where+are+my+party+guests? When the film moves to the Cat Kingdom itself, it feels like Haru in Wonderland, filled with courtly felines content with a monarch who alternates between surfer-dude cool ("Ciao, babe") and hair-raising lunacy. While Miyazaki and Takahata largely focus on quiet relationships, Morita emphasizes madcap action - for Haru's lacrosse save, animators used a slow-motion technique that would seem jarringly out of place in a Miyazaki film - and frantic situations. A more modern sensibility inhabits The Cat Returns when compared to other Ghibli works. Though Elwes provides the English voice, a few decades ago it could easily have been David Niven. Desperate to avoid a life of catnip and mice, Haru enlists help from the almost-Lilliputian Cat Bureau, led by the Baron and including the raven Toto (Elliott Gould) and a fat feline, Muta (Peter Boyle), also a returning character from Whisper.Ĭan+I+take+your+order.+sir? With his top hat, cane, coattails and dashingly aristocratic demeanor, the Baron comes off like a 19th-century League of Extraordinary Gentleman adventurer. Haru eventually finds herself "invited" to the Cat Kingdom for the rest of her existence. Turns out that the cat she saved is the royal heir, Prince Lune. While Haru puzzles over the matter for the rest of the day, word of her heroic deed filters back to the Cat Kingdom, which earns Haru a visit that night from a royal procession, complete with feline Secret Service agents to guard the Cat King (Tim Curry). Afterward, the cat stands on its hind legs, thanks the befuddled Haru and goes on his way. That last trait shows itself in the strongest way when she runs in front of a truck and uses her lacrosse stick to save a cat from becoming roadkill. Seventeen-year-old Haru (Anne Hathaway) starts the movie as a typically teenager, harried, prone to oversleeping, gossiping, fawning over boys and acting impulsively. Baron Humbert Von Gikkemgen (voiced in English by Cary Elwes), a cat statue come-to-life who provided some sage advice to Whisper's heroine, helps another girl in The Cat Returns, but in a more visceral role.
It's probably no coincidence that The Cat Returns follows up on a character from Ghibli's only other non-Miyazaki/Takahata movie, Whisper of the Heart. The Cat Returns feels more contemporary than other Ghibli productions without losing the fundamentally high quality that sets the studio's work apart from other anime.
Novice director Hiroyuki Morita proved to be a wise choice. Hayao Miyazaki or Isao Takahata directed every Ghibli theatrical feature but one prior to 2002, and studio officials wanted to broaden the company's talent base. The Cat Returns is a new movie from Studio Ghibli not only in terms of chronology, but also direction.