What is Hayao Miyazaki trying to say?

Japanese animation master Hayao Miyazaki recently reversed his retirement and released a theatrical animation. The title is [The Boy and the Heron] - (original title name) 'How Do You Live?' It is another masterpiece that contains Hayao's deep philosophy on history. It is a bit deep, so after watching it, you may wonder, "What on earth is this about?" I will tell you my own interpretation of [The Boy and the Heron]

 

This is Hayao's masterpiece that came out after quite some time. (Photo by Wikipidia)

Hayao's unique perspective

 Looking at Hayao's works, there are many stories about the ambiguous middle ground where there is neither perfect good nor perfect evil. When looking at it from the perspective of Koreans who like to clearly distinguish between good and evil, there are many times when I wonder, "What is this?" in [Porco Rosso], [Howl's Moving Castle], and [Spirited Away], from a Korean perspective, that character is clearly a bad guy... but why does he end up just a funny character in the end? In his early long-running TV animation, [Future Boy Conan], even the villainous captain becomes a villain and even the absolute evil director ends up being a funny character in the end, so it seems that Hayao has a deep philosophy about the real world where there is no clear distinction between good and evil. In the real world we live in, there are not many things that can be clearly drawn as if cutting tofu with a knife...

 In the real world, there are no absolute evil people or absolute good people, but each person acts for their own reasons in the situation they are in and influences each other. It's such a complex world, but I think Hayao Miyazaki is an impressive writer who uses various characters to portray such a world in such a colorful way.

 

 

The story of the story

 [The boy and the Heron] begins with the story of a boy who lost his mother in the hospital during the Tokyo air raid at the end of World War II. After losing his mother, he and his father went to the countryside away from Tokyo, where he met his father's new wife, Natsuko (his mother's younger sister), who would become his new mother. The new mother was pregnant with the child of the boy's father, and the boy was somewhat confused about this situation. The father was the owner of a factory that manufactured and supplied canopies for Japan's proud Zero fighter jets, so the family seemed quite wealthy.


The boy meets a strange heron, a talking heron, and goes on a strange adventure through a mysterious tower that has descended from the sky in this town since ancient times. The main plot of this movie is that he meets his dead mother, his missing new mother, his great-grandfather, and hears various stories.

 

 

The Meiji Restoration is a gift, and later generations misusing it

 First of all, this is my own interpretation, so you are the ones who decide whether this is right or wrong. If you think it is wrong, then your thoughts are correct.^^

 The tower that came down from the sky really means the Meiji Restoration, which came down suddenly like a gift. Until then, Japan was a country that pursued a policy of isolation during the Edo shogunate. It severely restricted exchanges with the West, and especially suppressed the Jesuits. Then, when the American black ships arrived, it forcibly opened up and became a new country through the Meiji Restoration, which was in a way like a gift. Makoto, the main character, tells the story of the Meiji Restoration and says that he received a great gift. That's right. From then on, Japan became a completely different country than before. It became the most advanced country in Asia and the country with the highest economic growth rate in the world. It was a huge blessing for them.

 However, the problem arose over how to use this gift. The pelicans that the protagonist encounters in the mysterious world probably represent the Japanese military. And the parrots in another castle represent the imperialists who inherited this military. When the cute Warawaras fly up to be reborn as life in the real world, the pelicans that attacked and ate them, and the pelican that was hit by the flames and had its wings damaged, can give us a hint if we listen to its story as it dies. Our generation tried to somehow fly and escape this world, but in the end, they couldn't escape, and our next generation has lost the ability to fly, so they eat Warawaras like that to survive... I think this describes the era when the early generations of the Meiji Restoration dreamed of de-Asia, but they eventually lost that dream by going in the wrong direction and just kept repeating greedy invasions.

 Grandfather stacks small stones to balance the world. He wants to pass this work on to Makoto when he gets old. However, the wise Makoto feels that it is meaningless to continue to build a precarious stone tower that is gradually twisted and built on the foundation of the Meiji Restoration. In the end, the tower collapses under the sword of the king of the imperialist parrots, and the world of Japan that had grown so precariously collapses. It is a defeat in the war and the downfall of the country.

 Even so, his great-grandfather leaves him with one task. He asks Makoto to inherit the throne and lead a just, safe, and beautiful world...

 In the beginning of the play, before Makoto enters this strange world, he receives a book gift from his mother, and the title of the book is 'How Will You Live?' The day that this book was given to him was 'Showa 12', Showa 12 being 1937, the time when the Sino-Japanese War broke out and the Nanjing Massacre occurred. From Japan's perspective, Joseon was taken over by King Gojong of Joseon who sold his country himself, so to speak, without firing a shot, and Manchuria, which was then unclaimed, was also easily taken over. In some ways, it could be interpreted that it was a peaceful expansion since it was a territory expanded without war. (Of course, the position of the one who was affected would be different...) Anyway, it had grown without much difficulty up to this point (of course, the victory in the Sino-Japanese War and the Russo-Japanese War was a great help...), but it was the Sino-Japanese War that led to its downfall - the Sino-Japanese War widened the front line, and the US, which had secretly approved Japan's expansion until then, began to apply the brakes - this was the Sino-Japanese War. -, The starting point of the question of 'How should we live?' is this day. Another foreshadowing. Hayao interprets this story as conveying this message. I think he wanted to say, "Will you use your glory, which seemed like an unexpected gift, to commit atrocities like war, or will you use it to create a force of peace that makes the world richer and more beautiful?" I think this story contains his long-standing anti-war thoughts that if you choose the former, you will inevitably face a sad ending in a catastrophic war.

 

 

The same story for us

 The same question is asked of us today. We gained unexpected independence with external help, and received the gift of high growth based on liberal democracy that we could not have imagined at the time. Based on that gift, we were becoming a country that was loved and recognized by the world. However, the unfortunate reality is that this precious gift is being torn apart by the disease of fighting, slandering, and not forgiving each other. Isn’t our endless demand for reflection and yet endless refusal to forgive perhaps a contradiction in terms?

 I think this movie asked us the same question: how will you, who have received such a precious gift, live in the future? Will you take the path of hatred that is expected to have a miserable outcome, or will you take the beautiful path of peace and harmony at the crossroads of choice?