The idea of marrying your spouse's sibling after said spouse's death is a common custom for some cultures throughout human history. Usually, this is done for stability and survival, especially on the women's part. Anyway, this movie was really good. It's still not my top 3 Studio Ghibli films (Spirited Away, Kiki's Delivery Service, and Whisper of the Heart), but it's a hell lot better than most Disney's films that came out in 2023. I was pleasantly surprised by Robert Pattinson's performance as the Grey Heron! He did a wonderful job as Batman and I remember liking him very much as Cedric Diggory in Harry Potter 4. Goes to show you that the Twilight franchise can't put a stain on his true talent! I really hope to see more this his performances at this rate! I'm glad to see other actors returning in this film, too! Mark Hamil, who voiced the villain in Castle in the Sky, returned as Mahito's great-uncle; Christian Bale, who voiced Howl in Howl's Moving Castle, returned as Mahito's father; and Willem Dafoe, who voiced the evil and soft-spoken Cob from Tales from Earthsea, returned briefly as the pelican!

Honestly, it looks gorgeous. Ghibli does it again! EDIT: If you like WWII themed Ghibli films, "Hotaru no Haka" was a good film. It was a bit disturbing but hey, its good.

Marrying your wife's sister might seem odd, but was not out of the ordinary, done mostly for practical reason: you already know each other, the money stays in the family, and war doesn't really leaves you time for falling in love anyway (especially when the government/society is in dire need for a higher birth rate). There might also be some weird bloodline-reasoning behind it, but I don't know anything about pre-modern Japan's popular beliefs, so that's just a guess.

Robert Pattinson was Unhinged, Amazing, and Funny all at the same time as the Grey Heron!!!

Robert Pattinson’s voice acting my goodness what a phenomenal performance

Marrying the sibling of a spouse after the spouse’s death seems to be a pretty common custom in a number of cultures (one of my mother’s friends married the brother of her first husband, the men being of Lebanese descent and, if I remember right, practicing Muslims-funny note, when I first saw Look Who’s Talking in theaters as a child, I was confused by the constant references to lesbians and lesbos (but not artificial insemination, somehow) and for at least a couple of years, I conflated those terms with Lebanese, and I just didn’t understand why all the characters in the movie were making fun of them). That said, despite being a long-time fan of anime and Japanese movies, I have questions about the family structure in this movie. I’ve only seen it once, dubbed, so maybe I just need to watch it again (I might be misremembering some of the details), but I’ve found myself wondering why Mahito’s new mother is already pregnant (yes, I know she had to have had sex) despite Mahito apparently never having seen her before (at least not since his mother was alive). It makes me suspect that instead of being his biological aunt, maybe she’s a widow of one of Mahito’s uncles (perhaps he died in the war), and perhaps Mahito’s father volunteered to marry her due to her existing pregnancy. If Mahito’s mother and stepmother are actually related, why do they seem so distant (I can’t remember if they ever show her in the past or if she ever recalls any stories about her supposed sister)? And if the baby is biologically Mahito’s full brother, why wasn’t the aunt living with them, and if his father didn’t knock her up out of wedlock and they were married but she stayed home to protect herself from the bombings, why hadn’t Mahito met her since his mother was alive and why hadn’t he been evacuated to the countryside to live with her? Again, I feel like this is a more complex family arrangement than it appears.

I'm glad you saw this! I loved this so much! It was so awesome seeing handdrawn animation on the big screen! Robert Pattinson as the Heron is just 🙏

Edward Cullen's voice as the Heron is just.... 🫸 😑 👌. And everything you said about 2D animation is why I am happy that studios like GKIDS and Cartoon Saloon exist.

"It's beautiful. It's weird. It's Ghibli" Me, having misread the title as "The Boy and The Heroin": 👁👄👁

Ghibli is one of the animation goats.

Mark Hamill and Dave Batista voicing an anime? OK, that right there sold me. 😉😂🤣 Can't say that I've heard much about this, but does indeed sound interesting. May look into checking it out. Thank you, Sean.

Marrying your late husband's brother or the sister of your late wife as way of keeping families afloat was more common historically, even Mozart did it. Cheers!

Honestly Pattinson did such a good job here, and he apparently had a lot of fun with this role. I think he should consider a full time voice acting career.

Marrying the widow of one's brother is commanded of the Israelites in the Torah. In a traditional society, it keeps the property in the family and ideally is meant to make sure that the widow will be cared for.

Easily the best-looking film Ghibli so far.

A "will watch with my daughter " movie. Traditional.

"Unretired" pretty sure we all saw that coming eventually, can't keep a good director down.

My mom and I saw this movie in theaters. It’s a weird movie even for Miyazaki. We watched the subbed version, and I don’t remember the guy’s aunt becoming his stepmom in it.

I hope this earns Studio Gibli another Best Animated Feature Oscar. They've been long overdue another win.

After the misfire that was Earwig and the Witch... Yeah, we needed the real Miyazaki to come out of retirement.

I want to see this movie. I love Studio Ghibli films.

Oooo cool😊

So it's retelling Grave of the Fireflies

You never did a VLOG on the Saint Seiya movie, so you might do a Cinematic Excrement on that movie maybe? One positive note it stars Sean Bean and his character dying on screen.

When all the reviews felt the need to mention how weird it is I thought, it must be exceptionally weird even by Miyazaki's standards - I wonder what that looks like? Now I know. 🤣 But I really enjoyed it - another great work.

Good film, though it took a bit long to really start. The English cast was good, especially Robert Pattinson as the Heron. _Wow_ .

Re: whether calling the step-mom "some girl my dad likes" was a translation error. No. Did you catch that by the end he was calling her "mother"? It was an intentional choice.

It won the Oscar!

What is your favorite studio ghibli movie?

Been wondering if we should see this

Miyazaki giving a "Take That!" to the fascism that took over Japan and lead to WWII? Did he do that before?