jamestrusler
Sometimes it's a little rough around the edges and I'd be lying if I said it managed to land every punch, but it's an immensely satisfying and thought provoking movie that will touch your heart.Its approach and execution demonstrates that of Japan's unique culture. The train of thought is often perplexing to follow although I find this to be a benefit to the message.Its multi-layered offering will almost certainly be appreciated by all ages.What a wonderful approach to a well trodden path! Please watch this.
MisterWhiplash
Very, very, very strange. And of course the whole magical-ball/scrotum thing is weirdest of all... but once you get over that, it's a fun, sometimes sad sometimes very (yes) heartwarming story of these shape- shifting raccoons (or 'Tanuki') who are trying to fight for their land from being destroyed. Next to Tokyo? You don't say! Beautiful animation, especially inspired and delightful when the raccoons do their BIG parade of crazy crap in the middle of the city, and the narration from Maurice LaMarche (yes, Brain from Pinky and the Brain) works more often than not. Surprises me most of all that this is from the director of 'Grave of the Fireflies'. Guess he just wanted to have fun here, though not without a heavy-duty environmental message via Studio Ghibli (from Hayao MIyazaki? You also don't say). I'm not entirely sure I can recommend it to, you know, a newcomer to the studio's works. It's at times just so leaps off from anything bound to reality (well, hey, talking 'Tanuki', you gotta go with it from there) that you just got to stick with it. Some of the comedy is very funny, some of it just feels odd, especially with the English translation (some folks like JK Simmons and John Dimaggio provide good voice-work too). It's like hearing a long but involving story from a friendly source, who in the end turns out to be someone who makes the story more profound and striking than it would have been otherwise. It's clever, trippy, and kids will be perplexed but may love it for its subversive quality. I mean, seriously, their scrotum are showing - but nothing else, so for Disney, it's okay (as opposed to Only Yesterday, which has a brief conversation about menstruation, but I digress).
SnakesOnAnAfricanPlain
I love Studio Ghibli. This was a huge disappointment. From the moment it started I knew it was going to be a poor effort from an exceptional studio. It was head achingly preachy and condescending from the very beginning. Princess Mononoke was able to evaluate the relationship between man and nature without coming off as educational seminar. In Pom Poko, we are given facts and figures and diagrams and highly obvious visual "metaphors". The entire film is a mess of wrongfully judged tonal shifts. Yes, it was brave to have the raccoons kill the humans, but it's attempt at comedy and cuteness it severely misjudged. The whole film is narrated over in a very lazy fashion. The film is pretty much told to us, without any attempt at creativity or visual imagination. There are no lead characters to connect with, making these raccoons as bad as the humans they fight, if not worse. There are also a lot of awkward moments involving male raccoons forcing themselves upon the females, and testicles that can morph. These testicles are used as humor but are simply not funny. It's an awkward movie with an obvious message, handled with none of the charm, passion, nor humanity, that I've come to expect from Ghibli.
I B
The high production values expected of Studio Ghibli are well to the fore, and so are the studio's well-established ecological concerns and emphasis on community. Pom Poko was supposedly inspired by the construction of a new suburb in the Tama Hills, west of Tokyo. The tanuki act like a collective of eco-protesters, with the same conflicts, wasted efforts and internal squabbles. Director Isao Takahata has a broad humorous streak, demonstrated by an extended visual gag about tanuki testicles. There are many folk stories about the ludicrous uses to which tanuki put their genitals, but most directors avoid including them in family films. He also laces the story with less explicit - and less explicitly Japanese - jokes, and as a result this is a funny, charming, and very entertaining film.
AD
