Christian reviews of Miyazaki movies

[HisaishiFan]

I was listening to the June CAA Radio podcast and there was mention of PluggedIn's cautionary anime and manga article. Of course I hopped on over to PluggedIn's web site and read the article. It was a bit of "fire! fire!" warning to parents--if that makes sense. I guess the problem I have with PluggedIn reviews is that they often don't go very deep, they just look at the surface of things and if something is nominally Christian they give it a thumbs up, whether there is any artistic merit or not. Whereas anime gets a thumbs down because it includes Japanese culture and religion, without looking at underlying positive moral lessons concerning friendship, loyalty, respect for your family and taking care of the environment.

That said, I'd like to recommend Steve Greydanus's reviews, the Decent Films Guide, "a site of film appreciation, information, and criticism informed by Christian faith".

"Decent Films is the online home of the film writing of Steven D. Greydanus, who is film critic for the National Catholic Register. A member of Online Film Critics Society and the Faith & Film Critics Circle, he also writes for Christianity Today Movies and Catholic Exchange."

To give you an idea of the difference between the two approaches, here are Steve's reviews and PluggedIn's reviews:

Spirited Away by Decent Films

Spirited Away by PluggedIn

Here are some more Decent Films reviews you might be interested in if you like Miyazaki.

Kiki's Deliver Service by Decent Films

My Neighbor Totoro by Decent Films

[Negotiatrix]

Thanks for the tip on another Christian movie review site!

[rocklobster]

Unfortunately, he's quite wary of Miyazaki, except for Kiki's Delivery Service. With the exception of Princess Mononoke, I'd feel pretty safe letting a kid watch Miyazaki's stuff.

[Mithrandir]

Hmm... I think I would be wary of a broad sweaping genralization like that. I'm personally a big fan of Studio Gibli, but there are a few titles I wouldn't show a kid:

* Spirited Away
* Princess Mononoke
* Fireflies
* (Unless the kid is young or old enough) the one about the Tanukis.
I'm sure there's more, but that's what popped into my head.

It's almost entirely dependant on the parent knowing their child. In fact, that's one of the reasons I built that reviews database up there ^. To give people a place to say what kind of stuff is where, so parents have enough information to make a judgement call.

[martinloyola]

Miyazaki is soooo wierd that knowing my nieces and nephews they probably wouldn't get what was going on in the story anyways lol, though I would also say that once I thought they were old enough to watch them for content reasons, they'd be old enough to be able to "understand them" and visa versa I don't know, maybe they are more obvious than that but Spirited Away just confused me awful, (or is that because I missed the first 30 min of it lol) *duh*

[jieshi]

ouchies, I just read an article on anime at pluggedin- they are harsh!! I agree wit what they say, but their use of emotive language and creative editing makes it appear that ALL anime is dark, sexually perverted, violent and anti-christ.

[Warrior 4 Jesus]

I wouldn't let little kids see Pom Poko, Grave of the Fireflies or Princess Mononoke but all the others are pretty safe content-wise. I'd say they are more weird than anything else but kids are usually good with that.

[HisaishiFan]

Greydanus loves Totoro, though, so I think he kinda gets it. I watch the Miyazaki or Ghibli film first, but once I've screened it I've let my kids (who are sort of little), see everything but Pom Poko and Lupin III. (And I don't even like Pom Poko--don't get me started on racoon pouches!) Anyway, the kids know a lot about the difference between real vs. not real, as in real spirits vs. fake spirits (fairies, brownies, etc) and Real God vs. fake gods (even though people used to believe in them) if that makes sense. We just talk about it alot and compare it to scripture. Same with Greek/Roman mythology and fairy tales and anything having to do with magic (Narnia, Harry Potter). They know God is the ONLY one who can do Real Magic (think Deep Magic).

[Warrior 4 Jesus]

That's a good way to do it. Good parenting!
Of the 11 Miyazaki movies I've seen the only one I didn't like was Pom Poko. The taniki 'pouches' were quite distracting and um disturbing.

[termyt]

Well, Spirited Away is a fantastic movie - a true masterpiece – with wonderful characters and good morals. In that respect, it’s a great movie for the whole family to watch. However, it is full of Eastern religious beliefs that must be understood as fantasy before viewing. No problem for a teen and probably not for the very young (although other aspects of the movie may keep me from showing it to them). But parents should want to avoid presenting a Spiritual double standard to their children that may confuse them.

“There is only one God, now lets watch this movie I love about many gods that live in everything.â€

[HisaishiFan]

I know what you mean about the Star Wars issue, termyt. I think most entertainment calls for spiritual family discussion and interaction, albeit on a really simple level for my kids because the are little. The messages in Disney, for example, just drive me crazy - so often the parents and adults are always dead or dumb or unreliable or otherwise occupied; the kids are brilliant, independent, loyal, perfect. And lots of "Christian" film/tv/books are pure drivel - the moral messages are oversimplified or spoon fed and the artistic and production values are embarrasingly poor. It is a real problem! On the other hand there is a lot of really good stuff out there, George MacDonald, CS Lewis, Madeline L'Engle - and I always tell my kids they aren't allowed to leave on any magic trains or go through any magic wardrobes without telling me first. On another note, for the longest time I never realized that a buckeye is nut . . . I thought buckeyes were these this little chocolate dipped peanut butter thingies! Duh! This is what happens you transplant a Floridian to the land near where the buckeyes grow.

[termyt]

On another note, for the longest time I never realized that a buckeye is nut . . . I thought buckeyes were these this little chocolate dipped peanut butter thingies! Duh! This is what happens you transplant a Floridian to the land near where the buckeyes grow.

Lol. I almost did a spit-take on that.

Just so you know, the peanut-butter ones are the only ones good to eat. ^_^

[HisaishiFan]

So no roasting buckeyes over an open fire . . . .