Saturday, April 20, 2013

The Secret World of Arrietty

I saw The Secret World of Arrietty. Amazingly, this is my first film for the 2012 crop. Unlike last year, this one starts off strong, with a charming and beautiful movie that I hope will end up near the top of my chart.

Caveats: it is animated, and dubbed, and the animation style is old-fashioned, not CGI. However, if you don’t appreciate the lushness of this film’s watercolor-like style, I don’t think I can be friends with you.


This movie is based on the award-winning children’s novel The Borrowers, by Mary Norton. I have not read the book, so I can’t comment as to how closely the movie follows the plot, but the movie has a good plot, so I’m ok. In short, very small people live in the walls of houses and borrow things from the big people to survive. If that sentence doesn’t sound so ridiculous you can’t handle it, go see the movie. It’s worthwhile.


For those of you who know what this means, the movie is not directed by Miyazaki, but it is from his studio, and he has a writing credit, and it has the kind of quality one expects from a Miyazaki film. For those of you who don’t know what that means, shame on you.


I do have one criticism of the film – it is pretty slow. Be prepared for a leisurely journey, and I think you’ll like it.

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