Hayao Miyazaki: Master of Japanese Animation

"Hayao Miyazaki: Master of Japanese Animation" [Paperback] by Helen McCarthy -- Artist-writer-director-producer Hayao Miyazaki is often called "the Walt Disney of Japan." His animated theatrical features have been smash hits in Japan, and many, including My Neighbor Totoro and Kiki's Delivery Service, are already familiar to American audiences. Now, with Disney-Miramax's imminent release of Princess Mononoke,, Miyazaki's masterwork and one of the top-grossing film in all Japanese history, this "animation master" is about to take America and the world by storm.

Mixing first-hand interview and personal insights with critical evaluations of art, plot, production qualities, and literary themes, McCarthy provides a film-by-film appraisal that examines technique as well as message. She reveals Miyazaki to be not just a master of the art of animation, but a meticulous craftsman who sees his work as a medium for shaping the humanistic and environmental concerns of our times.

An overview of the artist and his early career is followed by in-depth examinations of seven major Miyazaki films: Nausicaä of the Valley of Wind, Laputa: Castle in the Sky, Castle of Cagliostro, My Neighbor Totoro, Kiki's Delivery Service, Porco Rosso, and Princess Mononoke. Included are design and technical data, story synopses and character sketches, personnel and filmography data, and critical evaluation. Illustrations throughout, in color and black and white, show the detail and vigor of Miyazaki's art.

Written for anime fans as well as students of film, literature, and popular culture, McCarthy's book raises animation criticism to a whole new level and is an essential guide to the work of a world-class filmmaker.

London-based Helen McCarthy is author of Anime! A Beginner's Guide to Japanese Animation, The Anime Movie Guide, and (with Jonathan Clements) The Erotic Anime Movie Guide. She appears frequently on radio and TV and at conferences around the world. |...| [Amazon.com Editorial Review] Director Hayao Miyazaki ranks among the most interesting and original figures currently working in world animation. His charming children's films My Neighbor Totoro and Kiki's Delivery Service enjoy a rapidly growing audience in the U.S., and his brilliant Princess Mononoke, which broke box-office records in Japan, was released theatrically in the U.S. in November of 1999. Although storybook adaptations and a few Japanese volumes about individual films have appeared in the U.S., a major study of his work in English is long overdue. Miyazaki's many fans will enjoy Helen McCarthy's Hiyao Miyazaki and Mark Schilling's Princess Mononoke: The Art and Making of Japan's Most Popular Film of All Time, but neither is fully satisfactory.

McCarthy, who has written extensively about anime, offers an overview of the artist's career in animation and manga. She discusses each film in detail, with character descriptions and plot synopses, but she writes as a fan (rather than a critic or historian), and her text overflows with superlatives. Miyazaki is an exceptionally talented director, and his work merits a more discerning evaluation. McCarthy is also surprisingly careless about details: the ill-fated Japanese-American collaboration, Little Nemo, was in the works far longer than six years; and she describes the boar-god Nago in Mononoke as being wounded by a "ball of stone" when it's a actually an iron bullet. The latter may seem like nitpicking, but the hero's search for the source of the iron sets the plot of the film in motion. Finally, like Schilling's Princess Mononoke, Hiyao Miyazaki would have benefited from more careful proofreading; for example, McCarthy misspells the name of animation giant Winsor McCay. The extensive, but by no means complete, bibliography is a useful resource. --Charles Solomon. |...| "It is good at last to have a book in English about this master of film." -- Roger Ebert. |...| [About Helen McCarthy] Helen McCarthy (1951- ) has been researching and writing about Japanese popular culture since 1981. After a decade hearing that there was "no interest in that sort of thing" she founded a magazine, Anime UK, to disprove the claim. Her first book was published just over a year later, and she's been writing about anime, manga and Japan ever since. Her work has been translated into Chinese, French, Italian and Korean.

In 2010 she won a Harvey Award - the Oscars of the comics world - for her tenth book, 'The Art of Osamu Tezuka: God of Manga'. The book was also nominated for an Eisner Award. Helen's other awards include a Japan Foundation Award for furthering understanding of Japanese culture in the United Kingdom, and a Society of Authors/Sasakawa Foundation award.

She designs needlework, which led to the creation of "Manga Cross-Stitch", a book for those who want to use the energy of Japanese popular culture in their own embroidery. Combining a basic cross stitch course and a potted history of manga with a toolkit for designers and a wealth of fresh, enjoyable, easy-to-stitch charts, it has been welcomed by a host of stitchers.

She also writes poetry and tweets haiku and random nonsense daily. In her spare time, she studies and re-creates historic clothing and costume. She lives in London with an artist and a universe of toys.