Hayao Miyazaki

Hayao Miyazaki (宮崎 駿, Miyazaki Hayao^?, Bunkyō, Tokyo, January 5, 1941) is an internationally renowned Japanese animation film director, animator, illustrator, businessman, manga artist, and anime producer with a five-year career. decades. Along with Isao Takahata, he founded Studio Ghibli, a film and animation studio. He is compared by many to Walt Disney, Steven Spielberg or Orson Welles. His most popular animated films include titles such as Spirited Away (which surpassed box office revenue in Japan and surpassed the success obtained by Titanic, also won the award for Film of the Year (2001) at the Japan Academy Awards, and was the first anime film to win an Oscar), The Princess Mononoke, My Neighbor Totoro, Howl no Ugoku Shiro and Gake no ue no Ponyo. His films talk about humanity's relationship with nature, technology and the difficulty of maintaining a pacifist ethic; the protagonists are regularly strong and independent girls and young women. Two of his early films, The Castle of Cagliostro and The Castle in the Sky, feature traditional villains, while others, such as Nausicaä and Princess Mononoke (1997; the first animated film to win the Movie of the Year category at the Japan Academy Awards and briefly the highest-grossing film in Japan, until it was eclipsed by Titanic the same year), there are morally ambiguous antagonists with positive characteristics. He co-wrote Karigurashi no Arriety and Poppy Hill .

On September 1, 2013, he announced through a statement from company president Kōji Koshino that his film Kaze Tachinu (released in Japan on July 20, 2013) would be his last feature film, and that he would retire as director of Ghibli animation projects. In August 2014, the Hollywood Academy of Arts and Sciences announced that Miyazaki had been awarded an honorary Oscar in recognition of his lifetime achievement This award was presented to him at the Oscars ceremony in January 2015. In 2002, film critic Roger Ebert suggested that Miyazaki might be the best animated filmmaker in history, praising the depth and artistic level of Miyazaki. of his creations.

On February 25, 2017, Studio Ghibli officially confirmed Miyazaki's return with Kimitachi wa Dō Ikiru ka, which is expected to open in Japan in 2023. On August 10, 2017, the studio reopened its doors.

Early Years

Miyazaki was born in Bunkyō, Tokyo, as the second of four children born to Katsuji (1915–1993) and Yoshiko Miyazaki (1912-1983). His siblings are Arita (born July 1939), Yutaka (born in January 1944) and Shirō. His father was the director of Miyazaki Airplane, which built rudders for A6M Zero fighter jets during World War II. During the war, when Miyazaki was only 3 years old, his family was evacuated to Utsunomiya and after the bombing of Utsunomiya to Kanuma, in Tochigi Prefecture, where the Miyazaki Airplane factory was located. Miyazaki has said that his family was wealthy and could live comfortably during the war due to his father's and uncle's work in the war industry., but he also talks about how the night bombings in Utsunomiya, when he was 4 and a half years old, left a big impression on him. In his May 22, 1998 lecture at the Nagoya film festival, he recalled his family's withdrawal from the burning city, without providing transportation for people in need, and how fire colored the night sky as he looked up. the city while fleeing with his family to a safe distance.

In 1947, Miyazaki began his studies at Utsunomiya City Elementary, where he attended grades one through three before his family moved back to Suginami-ku, where he completed fourth grade at Omiya Elementary. For the fifth year, he attended the new Eifuku Elementary He graduated from Eifuku and attended Omiya High School. During this time, his mother Yoshiko fell ill with spinal tuberculosis and was bedridden from 1947 to 1955, finally dying in July 1980, at the age of 71. She spent the first few years in the hospital, but later they were able to care for her at home. Miyazaki wanted to be a manga author from a young age. He read the illustrated stories in children's magazines and recognized the influence of artists in the medium, such as Tetsuji Fukushima, Soji Yamakawa, and Osamu Tezuka. As a result of Tezuka's influence, Miyazaki destroyed much of his early art, believing that it was a "bad way" to copy Tezuka's style, because he was hiding his development as an artist.

After graduating from Omiya High School, Miyazaki began his studies at Toyotama High School. During his third year, Miyazaki's interest in animation was sparked by The Tale of the White Serpent.She “fell in love” with the film's heroine and left a great impression on him. His interest really started when he started his studies in high school. He was determined to become some kind of artist. His main interests were anime and manga, when they were just becoming popular. In order to become a freelance animator, he had to learn how to draw the human figure. After graduating from Toyotama, Miyazaki attended Gakushuin University. and was a member of the "Children's Literature Research Club," the "closest thing to a comic book club today." He graduated from Gakushuin in 1963 in political science and economics.

He knew from a young age that he would dedicate himself to his father's business. He studied economics, however, in the 1960s he began working at Toei as an interposer (in charge of drawings between movements). Over time he became head of the studio, where he met Isao Takahata, a great friend who would later become a colleague at Studio Ghibli. He started his career as an animator in 1963, when he joined Toei Animation; there he worked as a Tweening artist on Gulliver's Travels Beyond the Moon, where he shaped some ideas that would later become the ending of the film. He gained more responsibilities in his first years of work, which led him to collaborate with Isao Takahata in the anime Heidi, Marco and Ana de las Tejas Verdes for the Zuiyô Enterprise studio, which would later become Nippon Animation, in the 1970s. In 1978 he directed his first series, Conan the Child from the Future , and in 1979 his first film, Lupine III: The Castle of Cagliostro , the only one not considered from Studio Ghibli.

After creating the Lupin film, Miyazaki developed an anime in his own studio. In 1982 the manga Kaze no Tani no Naushika (Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind) first appeared in the Animage magazine as the result of one of those ideas. This work gives a strong boost to his career, by showing a different style, going from the children's comic to the prevailing one at the time. He had previously only published a couple of manga, including Shuna no taby . While freelancing, he worked on a manga, which was very well received by readers and was offered the opportunity to make an animated version of Nausicaä. This offer finally gave him the opportunity to carry out his long-awaited project of creating a studio. In 1984, he came Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind. In the first half of the 1980s he directed some episodes of the animated series Sherlock Holmes and in 1985, together with Isao Takahata, he opened his own animation studio: Studio Ghibli, where he continued producing films.

Career

Early works and Toei Animation

In April 1963, Miyazaki got a job at Toei Animation as a Tweening artist on the theatrical anime Watchdog Bow Bow (Wanwan Chushingura) and the television anime, Wolf Boy Ken . He was a leader in a labor dispute, which happened shortly after his arrival at the company, and became chief secretary of Toei's labor union in 1964. He was first recognized while working as a tweening artist on Toei's production Gulliver's Travels Beyond the Moon (Garibā no Uchuu Ryokō) in 1965. He found the original ending of the script unsatisfactory, and developed his own idea, which became the ending used in the finished film.

In 1968, he played a major role as chief animator, concept artist, and scene designer on The Adventures of Horus, Prince of the Sun, an iconic animated film. During the collaborative process adopted for the project, he had the opportunity to share his ideas and work closely with his mentor, animation director Yasuo Ōtsuka, whose innovative approach to animation left a great impact on the work. of the. The film was directed by Isao Takahata, with whom he continued to collaborate throughout his career. In Puss in Boots (1969), Miyazaki again had a key role in animation, as well as design, storyboarding, and story ideas, including the cinematic chase scene. He also illustrated the manga, as a promotional licensed product, for the production of Puss in Boots. Toei Animation produced two sequels to this film, during the 1970s, and the character would end up as the studio's mascot, but Miyazaki was not involved in either sequel. Shortly thereafter, he proposed scenes in the script for Flying Phantom Ship, in which military tanks descend on the city of Tokyo causing hysteria, and was hired to script and animate those scenes. Miyazaki played a crucial role in developing the structure, character creation, and design for Hiroshi Ikeda's adaptation Animal Treasure Island, and in the adaptation of Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves, by Hiroshi Shidara. Miyazaki also helped with storyboarding and scene animation on both films, as well as doing the promotional manga for Animal Treasure Island.

Miyazaki left Toei for A Pro in August 1971, where he co-directed 14 episodes of the first series, Isao Takahata's Lupin III. That year the two also began pre-producing a Pippi Långstrump series and drew extensive storyboards for the series. However, after traveling to Sweden to do research for the film and meeting the original author, Astrid Lindgren, permission to complete the project was not granted, and it was cancelled. In 1972 and 1973, Miyazaki created, wrote, designed, and animated two Panda! Go, Panda!, directed by Takahata.

After they moved to Zuiyo Eizo in 1974, he worked as an animator at World Masterpiece Theater with Takahata, which included his adaptation of the first part of Johanna Spyri's novel, Heidi, to the animated television series, Heidi. The company continued as Nippon Animation in 1975. Miyazaki also directed the series Conan, the Child from the Future (1978), an adaptation of Alexander Key's children's novel, The Incredible Tide.

Style and influence

Miyazaki rejects traditional scripts in his productions, instead developing the film's narrative while designing the storyboards. "We never know where the story will go, but we're still working on the movie as it unfolds," he said. In each of his films, Miyazaki has employed traditional animation methods, drawing each frame by hand; CGI has been used in several of his later films, beginning with Princess Mononoke, to "enrich the visual aspect", although he ensures that each film can "retain the correct ratio between work by hand and computer and I can still call my movies 2D". He oversees every frame of his movies.

Miyazaki has cited several Japanese artists as his influences, including Sanpei Shirato, Osamu Tezuka, Soji Yamakawa, and Isao Takahata, and in various interviews he has also named Akira Kurosawa as one of the most influential filmmakers he has had in his career.. Several Western authors have also influenced his works, including Frédéric Back, Lewis Carroll, Roald Dahl, Jean Giraud, Paul Grimault, Ursula K. Le Guin, and Yuri Norstein, as well as the animation studio Aardman Animations (specifically the works by Nick Park). Specific works that have influenced Miyazaki include Animal Farm (1945), The Snow Queen (1957), and The King and the Mockingbird (1980). When animating young children, Miyazaki often draws inspiration from the children of his friends, as well as his own childhood memories.

Miyazaki has been cited as an inspiration to numerous animators, directors and writers around the world, including Guillermo del Toro, Pete Docter, Glen Keane, John Lasseter, James Cameron, Steven Spielberg, Wes Anderson, Mamoru Hosoda, Makoto Shinkai, Henry Selick, Travis Knight, Dean DeBlois, Jennifer Lee, and Nick Park. Keane said that Miyazaki is a "big influence" at Walt Disney Animation Studios and has been "part of our heritage" from The Rescuers Down Under (1990). Artists from Pixar and Aardman Studios signed a tribute saying, "You are our inspiration, Miyazaki-san!". He has also been cited as an inspiration to game designers including Shigeru Miyamoto and Hironobu Sakaguchi, as well as Avatar: The Last Airbender, and Ori and the Blind Forest (2015).

Work

Most of his work includes anti-war messages or addresses complex issues such as the human being and nature, progress, individualism and responsibility, which has earned him the recognition of experts, filmmakers and many of his followers, the public of the West and the specialists.

Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind is considered the first Studio Ghibli film. It marked his first great success in Japan and the creation of said study.

Princess Mononoke brought him great international recognition, as it was one of the first films from his studio to be released to the world. Works prior to this, such as My Neighbor Totoro, Kiki, Home Delivery or Porco Rosso, achieved a certain international interest.

Spirited Away received the Golden Bear at the 2002 Berlinale, the Oscar for Best Animated Film in 2002, and recognition for his career at the International Festival of Cinema of Venice.

Howl no Ugoku Shiro was nominated for an Oscar in 2005 for best animated film.

With Gake no ue no Ponyo, he once again won critical acclaim and was one of twenty nominees for the 2009 Oscars in the Best Animated Film category.

And with Kaze Tachinu he earned another 2013 Oscar nomination in the Best Animated Film category.

TV

He directed:

• Lupin III - (laughing) Rupan sansei), 1968 (14 episodes)
• Conan, the child of the future - (laughing) Mirai Shōnen Konan), 1978
• Sherlock Holmes - (watchwords ム - - - ・ Meitantei Hōmuzu), 1984 (some episodes)

As a designer and animator:

• The Moomin - (- ム - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 。 Tanoshii Mūmin Ikka), 1969 (main animation in the first episode)
• Akko's secret ((のののの (。 Himitsu no Akko-chan), 1969 (main animation in some episodes)
• Heidi - (tented linking herself to dinner) Arupusu no Shōjo Haiji1974 (design and continuity)
• The dog of Flanders - (GRUNTING) Furandâsu no inu), 1975 (animation)
• Framework - (PHOOSING) Haha wo tazunete sanzenri1976 (design and continuity)
• Ana de las Tejas Verdes - (this is how to build upon consuming Akage no an, "Ana of red hair"), 1979 (design)
• Rascal, the raccoon - (Interpretation of the phrase Araiguma Rascal), 1977 (main animation in 20 episodes)

Filmography

• First year Ninja Fujimaru style-(urge to gain momentum Shonen Ninja Kaze no Fujimaru), 1964
• Lupin III- (laughing) Rupan sansei), 1971
• Lupin III: The Castle of Cagliostro - (urge to explore the discourses of innovation Rupan sansei: Kariosutoro no shiro), 1979
• Ana of green tiles-(á ̄s warning Akage no an), 1979
• Nausicaä del Valle del Viento - (cf. Kaze no tani no Naushika), 1984
• The castle in the sky - (exhibiting MER MER MERRY MERCHING) Tenkū no shiro Rapyuta), 1986
• My neighbor Totoro - (condemnation of the discourse Tonari no Totoro), 1988
• Nicky, witch apprentice - (Signed) Majo no takkyūbin), 1989 (In Hispanic America: Kiki: Home Deliveryin Argentina: The delivery of Kiki)
• Porco Rosso - Kurenai no buta), 1992
• Princess Mononoke - Mononoke Hime), 1997
• The Journey of Chihiro - (firm innovation conscious transformation Sen to Chihiro no kamikakushi), 2001
• Howl no Ugoku Shiro - (galoreologically) Hauru no ugoku shiro), 2004 (In Hispanic America: The amazing vagabond castlein Spain: The street castle)
• Gake no ue no Ponyo - (I am sorry for the disciples Gake no ue no Ponyo2008 (In Hispanic America: Ponyo and the sirenite secretin Spain: I put on the cliff)
• Kaze Tachinu - (. Kaze Tachinu), 2013 (In Hispanic America: The wind risesin Spain: The wind rises)
• How do you live? - (- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Kimitachi wa dō ikiru ka), 2023-2024

As a writer or producer:

• The Adventures of Horus, Prince of the Sun - (booknotes ك أعربية Taiyō no ⋅ji: Horusu no Daibōken), 1968 (productor, animation director, graphic designer)
• The Cat with Boots - (はのの - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Nagagutsu or Haita Neko), 1969 (executive producer, graphic designer)
• Panda Go Panda - (engineering ・كمعمومعامامامامامامامامامامامامامن Panda Kopanda), 1972 (guionist)
• Memories of yesterday - Omohide Poro Poro), 1991 (productor)
• Pompoko - (cf. Heisei Tanuki Gassen Pompoko), 1994 (producer)
• Susurers of the Heart - (PHONE BLESING) Mimi wo sumaseba), 1995 (guionist, producer and executive producer)
• Neko no ongaeshi - (- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -的 - - - - - - - -的 - - - - - - - - -的 - - - - - - - - - - - Neko no ongaeshi), 2002 (guionist)
• Karigurashi no Arriety - (interpretation from generation to generation) Karigurashi no Arrietty), 2010 (guionist)
• The hill of the poppy - (continued) Kokuriko-zaka kara), 2011 (guionist)

Awards

Oscars

BAFTA Awards

Cesar Awards

Japan Academy Awards

Film Critics Awards

Saturn Awards

Satellite Awards

Annie Awards

Berlin International Film Festival

Venice International Film Festival

Mainichi Film Festival