Country: Japan
  • Jamie Creese
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Ringing Bell. Dir. Masami Hata. Crunchyroll. 1978.
Ringing Bell. Dir. Masami Hata. Crunchyroll. 1978. 1434 1080 Jamie Creese

FIGURE 1: A piece of promotional material for Ringing Bell. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DQt8CqVPNC4&t=262s FIGURE 2: The film’s opening song, and the address that follows. “Wolf! Alright, I’ve decided to be your apprentice…

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  • Eve Bayliss
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Spirited Away. Dir Hayao Miyazaki. Toho Company Ltd. 2001.
Spirited Away. Dir Hayao Miyazaki. Toho Company Ltd. 2001. 560 360 Eve Bayliss

Miyazaki’s 2001 Spirited Away, blurs the binary of human, animal, mythology, and spirit. Each character has its own version of this intersectionality, creating different presentations of ontology that in turn…

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  • Lauren Webb
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Godzilla: King of the Monsters. Dir. Michael Dougherty. Warner Bros. Pictures. 2019.
Godzilla: King of the Monsters. Dir. Michael Dougherty. Warner Bros. Pictures. 2019. 150 150 Lauren Webb

“Good thing he’s on our side” … “For now” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QFxN2oDKk0E Figure 1 – Godzilla: King of the Monsters trailer. How do we define the term ‘Monster’? Or perhaps, how should…

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  • Maria Stoll
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A Whisker Away. Dir. Junichi Sato & Tomotaka Shibayama. Studio Colorido, Netflix. 2020.
A Whisker Away. Dir. Junichi Sato & Tomotaka Shibayama. Studio Colorido, Netflix. 2020. 150 150 Maria Stoll

In their 2020 film A Whisker Away, Junichi Sato and Tomotaka Shibayama explore the story of 14-year-old Miyo Sasaki, who transforms into a cat with the help of a Noh…

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  • Maria Stoll
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A Whisker Away. Dir. Junichi Sato & Tomotaka Shibayama. Studio Colorido, Netflix. 2020.
A Whisker Away. Dir. Junichi Sato & Tomotaka Shibayama. Studio Colorido, Netflix. 2020. 150 150 Maria Stoll

In A Whisker Away, the 14-year-old Miyo Sasaki takes extreme measures in order to be close to her school crush Kento Hinode, even accepting a cat mask from a dubious…

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  • Hannah Whelan
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Howl’s Moving Castle. Dir. Hayao Miyazaki. Studio Ghibli. 2004.
Howl’s Moving Castle. Dir. Hayao Miyazaki. Studio Ghibli. 2004. 150 150 Hannah Whelan

There is a surprising lack of non-human animal representation in Studio Ghibli’s 2004 film Howl’s Moving Castle, despite an overarching theme which frequently pits an idyllic pastoral version of Japan…

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  • William Murray
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Mary and the Witch’s Flower. Dir. Hiromasa Yonebayashi. Toho. 2017.
Mary and the Witch’s Flower. Dir. Hiromasa Yonebayashi. Toho. 2017. 150 150 William Murray

Mary and the Witch’s Flower is a 2017 animated film, directed by Hiromasa Yonebayashi and produced by Studio Ponoc (founded by the former lead film producer at Studio Ghibli). The…

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  • Yelin Jang
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Wolf Children. Dir. Mamoru Hosoda. Toho. 2012.
Wolf Children. Dir. Mamoru Hosoda. Toho. 2012. 150 150 Yelin Jang

Wolf Children describes the maturation of two werewolf children, Yuki and Ame, and their human-being mother, Hana, with great sensitivity. The werewolf children struggle between their two identities – human…

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  • Emerald Kenny
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Pom Poko. Dir. Isao Takahata. Toho. 1994.
Pom Poko. Dir. Isao Takahata. Toho. 1994. 150 150 Emerald Kenny

Pom Poko[1] is a film that follows the tanuki of Tama Hills trying to halt development of their woodland through their folkloric transformation powers. In terms of how it shows…

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  • Christopher Dobelmann
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Pom Poko. Dir. Isao Takahata. Studio Ghibli. 1994.
Pom Poko. Dir. Isao Takahata. Studio Ghibli. 1994. 150 150 Christopher Dobelmann

Pom Poko. Dir. Isao Takahata. Studio Ghibli. 1994 Pom Poko (Heisei Tanuki Gassen Ponpoko) is written and directed by Isao Takahata, a co-founder of Studio Ghibli which animated and published…

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