Isao Takahata

Synopsis:
Legendary animators Hayao Miyazaki and Isao Takahata team up to create this nostalgic animated work aimed at adult women, based on a manga by Yuko Tone and Kei Okamoto. The film centers on Taeko, a 27-year-old office worker who is sick of her job and ready for a change. She suddenly recalls the year 1966, when she was young and full of hope. She ventures to rural Yamagata prefecture to visit her sister and her brother-in-law. There she helps with the family farm where they turn saffron flowers into pigment for lipstick. While there she meets a hunky young farmer who’s the cousin of her brother-in-law. She is immediately taken with his hard-working, salt-of-the-earth ways.Read More »

Quote:
Isao Takahata‘s Hotaru no Haka (The Grave of the Fireflies, 1988) is a brilliant piece of cinema. Set in Kobe, Japan, in 1945, the film focuses on a brother and sister who are left orphaned and homeless by the American firebombing of the city. It is unflinching in its portrayal of the realities of the war, a harrowing account of what such attacks meant for the ordinary people living in the target area. The children’s innocence and love for each other is no defence against the trials they face: their suffering is very real, their story a classic tragedy. That The Grave of the Fireflies is animated rather than live-action does not distract from its power to move, to provoke thought, to draw tears from the eyes. It is a masterpiece.Read More »

Found inside a shining stalk of bamboo by an old bamboo cutter and his wife, a tiny girl grows rapidly into an exquisite young lady. The mysterious young princess enthralls all who encounter her – but ultimately she must confront her fate, the punishment for her crime. Read More »