Okay, as the official anime nerd of DoorQ.com, it is my duty to bring to you the glory and wonders of Japanese animation. I've kinda been slacking on my blog posts for the past few months because of the new job and doing things even a censor bar couldn't protect you against with my boyfriend =)

No more, though! Back to my anime-gushing ways! I just spent a nice chunk of my raise (Can you believe it? People actually reward you for hard work and a good job) on some fabulous anime box sets spanning several different genres! This is gonna be TIGHT, DAWG!!!

*Ahem* Moving along... A few months ago, a bunch of friends of mine went with me to see Hayao Miyazaki's newest creation, Ponyo on the Cliff by the Sea, as interpreted by Disney at a midnight showing on the big screen! The story of the film is based very loosely on Hans Christian Andersen's "The Little Mermaid". VERY loosely. (Then again, the Disney version was based very loosely on the short story, as well =P)

The story follows Ponyo, a rebellious little goldfish who wants to explore the world and discover new things outside of the cramped little fish tank her sea-witch father keeps her and a whole school of sisters in. She eventually makes her way to a polluted bay, where she runs into Sosuke, who's down by the water playing with his toy boat. He catches Ponyo and decides to keep her as his own.

The conflict comes from Ponyo's father trying to get her back, and the uber-powerful magic that Ponyo accidentally steals that she uses without thinking of what the consequences might be. I don't want to say too much more because it's just more fun to watch the movie and find out! 

Studio Ghibli (pronounced jib-lee) did an AMAZING job with the animation. In this age of digital animation, it was refreshing to see such a stunning piece of animation that was hand-drawn. In fact, Miyazaki drew most of the water and waves himself, saying that he wanted to make sure that this very important element of the film needed to be expressed properly. 

Everything about the animation just seemed to bring the movie alive. The detailed sceneries looked almost like they were colored with crayons or colored pencils, while the foreground, fish and characters have that distinctive Studio Ghibli style that we've seen in all of their films since Nausicaa. I really don't know how to accurately describe the visual beauty that I saw blossom on the big screen accurately with words. It's just something you're going to have to see for yourself =)

Disney pulled off another great translation and dub, bringing in some big name actors to play even the most minor of parts. Noah Cyrus (Yes, she's related to THOSE Cyrus's) play the title character Ponyo and Frankie Jonas (Yes, he's related to THOSE Jonas's) played the other main character Sosuke. While I really didn't want to like those two, they did an excellent job (and it was nice to have kids voiced by kids for once). Tina Fey voiced Sosuke's mom and Matt Damon voiced his father, while Liam Neeson provided the voice for Ponyo's father and Cate Blanchette her mother. The cast was rounded out with Cloris Leachman, Betty White, Lily Tomlin and Marsh Clark played a bunch of old biddies at the nursing home Sosuke's mother works at.

See, I wasn't kidding about the big names in this movie! Funny thing is that Damon has maybe four lines, Blanchette about 10 and Neeson maybe having 25 or 30. The stars of the film are definitely Cyrus, Jonah and Fey. =) The only thing I can really bitch about there is that some of the pronunciations of the Japanese names were WAY THE FUCK off... But oh well; only other weeaboobies would be able to really tell that they're butchering the names.

The music of the film is epically awesome, as usual. Cyrus and Jonah even dubbed the Japanese smash hit theme song and did a little remix of it. Be careful when watching it, that song is a total ear worm and you'll find yourself humming it for the next week without even thinking about it.

The only thing about this film that keeps it (at least, for me) from joining the ranks of Nausicaa, < a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spirited_Away">Spirited Away and Howl's Moving Castle is that the plot is a little slow and some of the characters are just a tad big more ignorant than I could swallow. Who leaves two four year old children in a house, by themselves, during a hurricane that is in the process of flooding the town you're in? *Sigh*

For those two reasons, I give this movie four slices of ham out of five. If you have a sweet tooth, this movie with more than satisfy it. In fact, I recommend seeing a dentist after this film to help prevent cavities =) I believe the movie is still out in theaters, so catch it on the big screen while you can! If not, the DVD and Blu-ray Disc come out on March 2, 2009.