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Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff to Blow your Mind, a production of iHeartRadio.

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Speaker 2: Hey you welcome to Weird House Cinema. This is Rob Lamb.

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Speaker 3: And I am Joe McCormick, and today we're going to

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Speaker 3: be talking about the nineteen eighty four Japanese animated fantasy

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Speaker 3: film NAUSICAA of the Valley of the Wind, an entry

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Speaker 3: that I think fits very well in the Weird House

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Speaker 3: Cinema library because it contains a vision of a world

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Speaker 3: imagine with such a unique, confident weirdness that I think

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Speaker 3: it actually has come to seem less weird in the

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Speaker 3: intervening decades because its original imagery has influenced so much

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Speaker 3: other stuff that came after it. I just kept noticing,

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Speaker 3: like I feel like I see textures and themes and

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Speaker 3: contours and ideas from Nausica like I recognize them from

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Speaker 3: later media of the past few decades all over the place.

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Speaker 2: Absolutely, I mean, this is a film that's been highly

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Speaker 2: influential not only within the realm of Japanese cinema and

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Speaker 2: Japanese animation, but also in Japanese culture and the larger

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Speaker 2: cinematic culture of the world as a whole. Like this

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Speaker 2: is a film that casts a long shadow.

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Speaker 3: So I picked this movie because I knew it had

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Speaker 3: a reputation for being very beautiful and wonderful, and I

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Speaker 3: was a fan of Miyazaki already, the writer director, who

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Speaker 3: we'll talk about later. But after I watched it, you know,

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Speaker 3: in a way, I feel kind of at a loss.

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Speaker 3: We'll have to see how today goes. Because I like

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Speaker 3: this movie so much. I'm actually finding it a bit

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Speaker 3: difficult to put together the correct words to express my

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Speaker 3: thoughts about it. For me, Nausica feels almost a bit

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Speaker 3: beyond analysis. So I'm going to do the best I can.

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Speaker 3: But this might be a kind of weird episode.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, I know what you mean. Like this one

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Speaker 2: is we discussed a lot of films that are kind of,

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Speaker 2: you know, treasures from the Temple, or you know, they're

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Speaker 2: kind of sometimes they're curious items that are encrusted with

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Speaker 2: interesting jewels. But there is a structural completeness and just

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Speaker 2: a completeness of the artistic vision in Nausica that is,

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Speaker 2: to a certain extent, unlike anything we've covered before, Like

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Speaker 2: this might be the first time we've covered a film

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Speaker 2: on weird house cinema that I've long held up is

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Speaker 2: one of my favorite films. You know, some of the

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Speaker 2: films we've watched for Weird House have become some of

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Speaker 2: my favorite films. But Nausica is a film that has

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Speaker 2: a special place in my heart and in my life

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Speaker 2: with cinema. So I think I've mentioned this before. It's

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Speaker 2: my origin story with Nausica, Okay, And I think a

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Speaker 2: lot of people I was looking around. I saw some

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Speaker 2: other people online that seemed like they had a similar situation.

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Speaker 2: But I had a very early exposure to this film home,

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Speaker 2: and I didn't know what it was when I caught it.

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Speaker 2: This would have been let's see I actually I did

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Speaker 2: some figuring last night and I was able to get

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Speaker 2: a little closer to when it was. I want to

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Speaker 2: say this was probably the early nineties. I could be

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Speaker 2: wrong on that, but I was with my family somewhere

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Speaker 2: and we were staying in a hotel and that hotel

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Speaker 2: had HBO, and I turned on HBO there and there

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Speaker 2: was this animated movie being played, And you know, I

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Speaker 2: loved animation at that point, but my exposure to animation

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Speaker 2: was was kind of limited based on what was available

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Speaker 2: to a mainstream audience during the early nineties. So, you know,

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Speaker 2: I knew Disney I knew, and as far as Japanese

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Speaker 2: animation went, I knew things like you know, Voltron and

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Speaker 2: so forth I had. You know, I'd seen Rankin in

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Speaker 2: bass that sort of thing, But this, whatever this was,

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Speaker 2: it it seemed so different. You know, I'd never seen

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Speaker 2: anything that was at all calibrated for outside of a

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Speaker 2: childhood viewership, Like I don't think i'd seen any snippets

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Speaker 2: of heavy metal. Maybe i'd seen just a little. I

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Speaker 2: think I've seen part of an animated Wagner Opera short

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Speaker 2: on public broadcasting at some point, and that that felt

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Speaker 2: weird because I was like, this is clearly not for children, exactly,

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Speaker 2: like what is this? But yeah, here was this? This

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Speaker 2: this strange, weird and just very dramatic vision. I think

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Speaker 2: the clip I saw was from like the middle to

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Speaker 2: the early end portion of the film, and it enthralled me.

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Speaker 2: But then, you know it as a family trip, we

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Speaker 2: all had to leave you to turn off the TV,

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Speaker 2: and so we left the hotel room and I did

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Speaker 2: not find out what this film was, but it stuck

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Speaker 2: in my head and I remember it influencing things that

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Speaker 2: I imagined and thought about as like I was transitioning

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Speaker 2: into a different grade, and I was, you know, I

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Speaker 2: was imagining all these these things, and I could see

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Speaker 2: like this monster forming out of all these fleshy ropes

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Speaker 2: and all. Yeah. So this was a film that touched

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Speaker 2: me pretty deeply, but in that weird childhood way where

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Speaker 2: you don't really have much follow up on it. You

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Speaker 2: don't start asking around like, hey, I saw this movie

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Speaker 2: on HBO, what was it? Where can I find it.

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Speaker 3: I had a very similar experience with the Revelations of

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Speaker 3: Hotel Cable, with the Mystery Science Theater episode of the

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Speaker 3: Incredibly Strange Creatures who stopped living and became mixed up zombies.

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Speaker 2: Yeah.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, Sadly, I don't think I ever caught any Miyazaki

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Speaker 3: on the Hotel Cable though. It was always Sci Fi

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Speaker 3: channel stuff.

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Speaker 2: Well that sci Fi channel. It had a lot of

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Speaker 2: interesting things on it to expose people too, for sure.

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Speaker 2: But yeah, as far as this goes, this was my

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Speaker 2: earliest exposure to Miyazaki. I didn't know it was Miyazaki

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Speaker 2: at the time. I didn't know this was NAUSICAA and

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Speaker 2: I would be in my twenties before I re entered

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Speaker 2: the world of Miyazaki's films and realized that this perfect film,

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Speaker 2: or at least an imperfect cut of it, was what

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Speaker 2: had enthralled me as a child.

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Speaker 3: Oh so you think what you saw was part of

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Speaker 3: the Warriors of the Wind broadcast.

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Speaker 2: I think it likely was when I look at the

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Speaker 2: timeline of how things came together, and so it'll be

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Speaker 2: interesting to keep that in mind as we when we

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Speaker 2: discussed Lawyers of the Wind, which is an early North

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Speaker 2: American release and an edit of the film and also

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Speaker 2: a kind of a pretty rough dub I'm to understand,

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Speaker 2: but at the time, like that's what was available, and

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Speaker 2: that's what that's what I caught a glimpse of.

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Speaker 3: Well, even if the narrative we were totally structurally butchered

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Speaker 3: and a lot of the meaning were taken out of

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Speaker 3: the film, I can see how it would be appealing. Nonetheless,

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Speaker 3: because one thing that struck me about it was the

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Speaker 3: animation style. This is a film where you certainly do

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Speaker 3: need to hear the dialogue, Like the story told is

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Speaker 3: a wonderful story, and I wouldn't change really a single

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Speaker 3: thing about it. But I think this movie would also

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Speaker 3: work on mute, like you could chop it up and

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Speaker 3: you know, take out a lot of the story and

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Speaker 3: stuff and still have an enthralling time just watching the

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Speaker 3: animation because every scene really just in the visuals kind

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Speaker 3: of tells the story of its own and the way

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Speaker 3: a lot of the action is realized, the way the

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Speaker 3: characters move and the way shots are framed, is filled

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Speaker 3: with emotion completely by itself, without hearing what anybody says.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, in its complete cut, I think this

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Speaker 2: is as close to a perfect film as I can imagine.

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Speaker 2: And I don't use that term, you know, without some

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Speaker 2: forethought here, you know, it's I love flowed movies. Plenty

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Speaker 2: of flowed movies are among my favorites. But I think

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Speaker 2: this is a movie where absolutely everything works. But even

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Speaker 2: if you encounter it outside of that desired form, it's

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Speaker 2: like it's like encountering pieces of a of a temple

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Speaker 2: that was ruined, you know, in ancient times. You know,

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Speaker 2: even the fragments of it are going to speak of

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Speaker 2: the art that went into it. Like, so, you can

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Speaker 2: edit this film pretty severely, but you can't edit like

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Speaker 2: the environmental themes out of it. You can't edit the

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Speaker 2: weirdness and the wonder out of it completely. You're still

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Speaker 2: going to get some some intense flashes of that.

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Speaker 3: Right, So even if you do, as the Warriors of

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Speaker 3: the Wind cut apparently did, like try to edit out

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Speaker 3: a lot of the environmental themes about why we can't

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Speaker 3: destroy the jungle and stuff, you would still get the

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Speaker 3: moments in various scenes of like the way that Nausicaa

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Speaker 3: just like physically regards plants and animal life, and so

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Speaker 3: that you'd still get that like emotion coming through just

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Speaker 3: in those moments.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, and you still get that, like the music

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Speaker 2: is still there. The score wasn't replaced or anything, which

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Speaker 2: I'm to understand sometimes has occurred with anime films that

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Speaker 2: are cut and put back out in a different different markets.

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Speaker 2: So yeah, I'm not certainly not advising anyone watch the

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Speaker 2: Warriors of the Wind cut of the film. I think

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Speaker 2: that's only for like completists who really want to, you know,

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Speaker 2: understand the history of the film. I have no desire

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Speaker 2: to see it myself. But I'm also I've also read

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Speaker 2: from some people who have that point out, you know,

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Speaker 2: it's not a good cut, but it's not nearly as

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Speaker 2: bad as it could have been. It's not nearly as

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Speaker 2: bad as maybe some people make it out to be.

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Speaker 2: But hey, when you're dealing with a film that is,

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Speaker 2: you know, arguably perfect in its original cut, like, you know,

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Speaker 2: anything you do to it is potentially a defacement. You know.

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Speaker 3: I haven't seen it, so I can't really say, but

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Speaker 3: in reading about it, it does seem to me like

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Speaker 3: a pretty profoundly cursed artifact, especially with like the way

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Speaker 3: it was marketed. So there's like this poster for it

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Speaker 3: that just adds in some badass looking male characters who

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Speaker 3: are not characters in the movie. It just got to

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Speaker 3: put them in the center of the poster. I think

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Speaker 3: we talked about another movie that did that, like a

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Speaker 3: like a kid's fantasy movie from the eighties that had

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Speaker 3: a that had a girl as the protagonist, and so

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Speaker 3: they just eded in like a tough looking dude on

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Speaker 3: the poster, not in the film. What what was that.

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Speaker 2: A tough on I I don't remember off hand, but

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Speaker 2: yet this.

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Speaker 3: Oh oh it was one of the Ewoks movies.

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Speaker 2: Oh yes it was. It was one of It was

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Speaker 2: Battle for Indoor probably, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, So this

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Speaker 2: poster so that, yeah, War's the Wind, which we'll continue

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Speaker 2: to talk about here because you know, ultimately, when if

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Speaker 2: you're if you're poking fun about at anything regarding Nausica

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Speaker 2: it's Warriors of the Wind that deserves in the marketing

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Speaker 2: around where's the wind that deserves that attention? Warriors the

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Speaker 2: Wind seems to the poster seems to reimagine Nausicaa as

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Speaker 2: a basically like a heavy metal it's in the heavy

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Speaker 2: metal you know, comic and film franchise Doctor Doom on there. Yeah,

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Speaker 2: it kind of looks like a Doctor Doom. Also kind

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Speaker 2: of looks like a member of the Adeptus Mechanicus from

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Speaker 2: Warhammer forty thousand, the Tech Priests. There's there's some dude

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Speaker 2: in the middle with a machine gun or a laser

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Speaker 2: rifle that I don't think is in the film. There's

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Speaker 2: a guy with a gun riding a pegasus, which definitely

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Speaker 2: isn't in the film at all. There are no horses

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Speaker 2: in the film, even much less flying horses. And then

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Speaker 2: there's sort of a like a sexy Nausicaa in the background,

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Speaker 2: but you know, she's like way in the background, Like

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Speaker 2: clearly she's not the focal point of this film.

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Speaker 3: This poster just has evil corporate sorcery radiating off of it.

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Speaker 2: It is it is.

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Speaker 3: The business equivalent of necromancy. That the bad kind where

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Speaker 3: you're making skeleton armies, not the kind where you're just

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Speaker 3: talking to the dead.

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Speaker 2: It is. It's I hate it. Yeah, I mean, the

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Speaker 2: monster looks kind of cool about it. But but but

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Speaker 2: the monster, the monster looks cool because it is something

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Speaker 2: legitimate taken from the film. Even if they kind of like,

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Speaker 2: I mean, they I'm not even gonna say they made

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Speaker 2: it more horrible looking because it's extremely hard horrifying in

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Speaker 2: the movie itself. But the poster promises us that the

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Speaker 2: future has never been so exciting. And to be clear,

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Speaker 2: Naska is an exciting film. It is a very exciting film.

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Speaker 2: It has wonderful action sequences of some of the best

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Speaker 2: action sequences I've ever seen. And yet it's so much

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Speaker 2: more than that. It is a thoughtful film. It is

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Speaker 2: a film with deeply well thought out characters. So yeah, this,

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Speaker 2: I guess that's the whole thing about where it's the wind.

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Speaker 2: It attempts to reduce this to something that the producers

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Speaker 2: thought that the public could handle and that the public wanted.

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Speaker 3: Though, picking up on the first half of what you

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Speaker 3: said here, this is a movie with absolutely thrilling action

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Speaker 3: I complained about action a lot on Weird House Cinema.

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Speaker 3: I often talk about how action scenes are supposed to

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Speaker 3: be understood as exciting, but most of the time they're

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Speaker 3: incredibly boring. You've seen a million of these just mind

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Speaker 3: numbing actions. He's like close up of a guy shooting,

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Speaker 3: close up of something exploding. There's no drama to it.

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Speaker 3: There is no emotion, there's no suspense, there's no wondering

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Speaker 3: what's gonna happen, there's no really like having feelings about

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Speaker 3: the characters or watching interesting exchanges of power. It's actually

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Speaker 3: fairly rare that a movie gets action scenes right and

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Speaker 3: makes them exciting in the way that they could and

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Speaker 3: should be. And Nausica, despite being a movie that is

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Speaker 3: thoroughly against violence, has some of the best action scenes

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Speaker 3: of any movie I can think of. When you see

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Speaker 3: Nausica moving in a tense moment, like when she's racing

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Speaker 3: to the rescue, or there's a chase scene somebody's trying

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Speaker 3: to escape, or there's a fight about to break out,

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Speaker 3: it is absolutely thrilling. Like every moment, you are riveted,

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Speaker 3: or at least I was. And it's because it gets

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Speaker 3: all of those things. I just said, right, Like, the

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Speaker 3: action scenes are full of suspense and emotion. You don't

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Speaker 3: know how they're going to unfold, and there is drama

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Speaker 3: in it in the movements of the characters. There's a

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Speaker 3: lot of like feeling and struggle, and you are right

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Speaker 3: there with them, empathizing with them.

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Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah, I mean it's ultimately that complex alchemy of

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Speaker 2: great filmmaking and great storytelling. You know, it's like all

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Speaker 2: the elements that make me as ACTI films great from

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Speaker 2: just like this, the richness of the animation, that characters

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Speaker 2: move like human beings and animals move like animals, and

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Speaker 2: everything has weight this scene in that scene or intercut

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Speaker 2: so that everything feels like it's in the same place.

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Speaker 2: I mean, all of this adds together, and again you

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Speaker 2: have stakes, you have characters, and yeah, you have these

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Speaker 2: just riveting action sequences on the land and in the sky.

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Speaker 3: Oh and especially in the sky, because a lot of

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Speaker 3: the action in this film involves flying. This is another

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Speaker 3: case where I'm sorry, but I feel like I've been

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Speaker 3: struggling to find the right words to express my feelings here.

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Speaker 3: But I was talking to Rachel about this before we started.

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Speaker 3: According you know, there are a lot of movies that

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Speaker 3: involve some degree of kind of power fantasy identification with

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Speaker 3: the protagonist, to superhero movies, action movies. You want to

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Speaker 3: see the hero do something very confident, be very strong,

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Speaker 3: be a ninja, be a strong fighter, or something like that,

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Speaker 3: and you get a kind of exciting sense of identification

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Speaker 3: with the protagonists there. It's what a lot of superhero

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Speaker 3: movies are about and stuff. Nausica has that, but in

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Speaker 3: a way that I felt is so much better than

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Speaker 3: ninety nine percent of movies like that and kind of

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Speaker 3: cheapens them by comparison. The way it feels to watch

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Speaker 3: Nausica move and fly with her glider is so thrilling

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Speaker 3: and freeing in that sense of watching a character be

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Speaker 3: strong and free and be able to act swiftly and

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Speaker 3: do what they do with competence and confidence. But it's

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Speaker 3: not about like hurting and dominating people the way it

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Speaker 3: is in most movies like that. It's about the way

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Speaker 3: that she can fly, and I guess really it's about

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Speaker 3: the way that she can be where she needs to be.

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Speaker 2: Yes, yeah, Because, like you said, the violent action in

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Speaker 2: this film is intense and exciting and very entertaining, but

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Speaker 2: the film has a very strong pacifist core. It is

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Speaker 2: strongly anti violence, and you see that in these themes

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Speaker 2: where violence occurs, but violence almost never solves anything in

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Speaker 2: this movie. It's communication and empathy that solve problems. And yeah,

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Speaker 2: Nausica's ability to move quickly from one place to another

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Speaker 2: like that facilitates that kind of communication and negotiation.

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Speaker 3: I would say also, though, it's not just a kind

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Speaker 3: of shallow, unthinking rejection of violence, where like it just

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Speaker 3: so happens that violence is always bad. In the movie,

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Speaker 3: like you see innocent characters defending themselves violently against violent

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Speaker 3: attacks in a way that you totally empathize with, you know,

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Speaker 3: and it's not like they're condemned for doing so. So

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Speaker 3: like it, I think it has a mature relationship to pacifism,

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Speaker 3: you know, where like there are many situations where a

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Speaker 3: character has to use violence and they're not bad for

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Speaker 3: doing it. You understand why they're doing it, and you

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Speaker 3: and you're in a way can be on their side.

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Speaker 3: But also you kind of you kind of get to

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Speaker 3: zoom out and see the larger relationship of all these

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Speaker 3: violent interactions and see other ways that peace could be

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Speaker 3: achieved or that people could get what they want.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, and when the violence occurs, the violence has weight,

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Speaker 2: the violence has has a cost for both sides. You know.

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Speaker 2: It's like there's a character, Lord Yupa, who will discuss

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Speaker 2: here in Bett, who is described as a master swordsman,

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Speaker 2: and clearly he is extremely skilled with a blade and

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Speaker 2: kills multiple enemy soldiers and at least a couple of

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Speaker 2: major encounters. But it is negotiation that he falls back

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Speaker 2: on as his true skill to end those encounters and

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Speaker 2: to avoid death for himself or for you know, his compatriots.

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Speaker 2: And yeah, it's yeah, it's quite fascinating to take all

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Speaker 2: this apart, but yeah, he had and I think in

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Speaker 2: both of those sequences, or at least one key sequence,

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Speaker 2: like he has wounded himself. Nausicaa in trying to prevent

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Speaker 2: violence is also wounded. And so so yeah, there's no

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Speaker 2: like simplistic model of like violence bad, pacifism good. It

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Speaker 2: is a complex world full of interactions that we're witnessed

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Speaker 2: to in this film.

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Speaker 3: So anyway, another problem I've been thinking about when talking

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Speaker 3: about this episode is I really don't want to get

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Speaker 3: into like granular spoilers for the later part of the

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Speaker 3: plot or reveal too much about it, because it really

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Speaker 3: is the kind of movie where I would want people

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Speaker 3: to just watch it and just let it unfold for them.

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Speaker 3: So what can we say as a as a as

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Speaker 3: a very safe kind of elevator pitch here.

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Speaker 2: I mean, I just have to think about just the

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Speaker 2: larger genre that it establishes and grows here, and it's

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Speaker 2: just it's a post apocalyptic environmental fantasy epic, and yet

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Speaker 2: it's more than that too. So it's really hard to

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Speaker 2: pin this one down.

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Speaker 3: Should we do some trailer audio?

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Speaker 2: Yeah, and I was really tempted to play the Words

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Speaker 2: of the Wind trailer because it's ultimately perhaps more amusing

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Speaker 2: in a in a purely audio sense. So we'll probably

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Speaker 2: just hear a snippet of the original Japanese trailer for

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Speaker 2: NAUSICAA of the Valley of the Wind Jodi Yai. So

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Speaker 2: not state all right now, if you want to go

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Speaker 2: out and watch this film, and we highly recommend that

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Speaker 2: you do, certainly if you haven't seen it before, go

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Speaker 2: watch it before you continue on with this episode. It's

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Speaker 2: widely available in physical and digital formats. Your streaming source

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Speaker 2: for this is going to vary depending on international location.

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Speaker 2: I know there are some streaming sites that don't have

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Speaker 2: it until you cross an international border, and then you know,

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Speaker 2: then get excited because now all the Miyazaki films just

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Speaker 2: showed up in your streaming service. So yeah, depending on

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Speaker 2: where you are, you should be able to find it somewhere.

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Speaker 2: They're widely available and they're great.

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Speaker 3: I watched it on the Max Headroom streaming service you've

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Speaker 3: formerly known as HBO.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, available there as of this recording in the

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Speaker 2: United States anyway, but stuff has a way of vanishing

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Speaker 2: from there, so I don't know, you know, keep an

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Speaker 2: eye out for it. But the thing about these films

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Speaker 2: is they will remain available. You should be able to

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Speaker 2: find them somewhere, and I will say on the Max

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Speaker 2: environment especially and probably anywhere you might be streaming it.

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Speaker 2: You can watch it in the original Japanese with subtitles,

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Speaker 2: or you can watch it with with a really great dub.

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Speaker 2: This is the Disney dub that we'll discuss here in

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Speaker 2: a bit. This is not the Warriors of the of

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Speaker 2: the Wind dub. This is a really quality dub. So

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Speaker 2: you know, your taste may vary when it comes to

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Speaker 2: dub versus sub, but in my opinion, this is a

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Speaker 2: This is a great one. I agree.

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Speaker 3: I don't have a general preference for subtitles versus dubbing.

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Speaker 3: It's just case by case for me. But I think

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Speaker 3: this is a case where the later English dub is fantastic,

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Speaker 3: and we'll get into what some of those voices are later.

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Speaker 3: But like, I mean, how can you turn down Patrick

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Speaker 3: Stewart as lord you? Yeah?

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Speaker 2: All right, Well, let's talk about the people involved. I mean,

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Speaker 2: most of what we're going to discuss you with the

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Speaker 2: people is this is going to concern the director, the writer,

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Speaker 2: and author, also the author of the original manga upon

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Speaker 2: which it is based, and that is, of course Hayal

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Speaker 2: Miyazaki born nineteen forty one, still alive and still active

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Speaker 2: as of this recording, and with some details to come

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Speaker 2: on that last point. He is, of course a legendary

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Speaker 2: Japanese animator and filmmaker. And yeah, it's actually a bit

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Speaker 2: intimidating to attempt any sort of summary of his career,

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Speaker 2: because while we've touched on directors who have garnered cult

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Speaker 2: followings and even larger critical acclaim in their time, Miyazaki

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Speaker 2: is kind of in a league of his own. I mean,

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Speaker 2: who else can you speak of in the same breath,

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Speaker 2: like maybe like Akira Kurosarwa or Walt Disney or Jim Henson.

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Speaker 2: Those are just the three that came to my mind.

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Speaker 2: But I mean, he really stands on his own. It's

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Speaker 2: hard to compare him to anyone else.

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Speaker 3: He seems to me someone who just specializes in making

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00:23:03,640 --> 00:23:08,240
Speaker 3: perfect or near perfect after perfect or near perfect film. Yeah,

403
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Speaker 3: you know, it's just just cranking them out.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, and devoted to animation, you know, not one of

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Speaker 2: these artists where you see like them transitioning out of

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Speaker 2: animation into something else, like animation has been his key focus.

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Speaker 2: He's an artist that I think is rather defined by

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Speaker 2: his interest, certainly again with the medium animation and also

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Speaker 2: to a certain extent, manga. But also there are certain

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Speaker 2: frequently explored themes that I think come to define a

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Speaker 2: lot of his, if not all of his films. Those

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Speaker 2: are themes of environmentalism, feminism, pacifism. Also of course soaring

413
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Speaker 2: and flying, sometimes soaring and flying kind of at least

414
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Speaker 2: in Ponio, they the same theme goes under water, but

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Speaker 2: we still get this feel of soaring and flying only

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Speaker 2: beneath the waves. But yeah, Miyazaki obviously has a lot

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Speaker 2: of love enthusiasm for flight. I understand that he is,

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Speaker 2: or at least was at one point, a scale model enthusiast,

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Speaker 2: and you see that reflected in all the amazing airplane

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Speaker 2: designs in this film.

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Speaker 3: You know, I realized if I hadn't seen it and

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Speaker 3: someone had told me there are a lot of flying

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Speaker 3: scenes in it, I might be like, oh, Okay, that

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Speaker 3: sounds kind of boring. But it's like somebody telling you

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Speaker 3: there's a movie with a lot of driving scenes in it.

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Speaker 2: You know, yeah, it.

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Speaker 3: Could very well feel like padding. But that is not

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Speaker 3: my experience of these The flying scenes are as I

429
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Speaker 3: said earlier, they're full of emotion. They're lovingly crafted, and

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Speaker 3: they're intentional. It's not just like patting it out watching

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Speaker 3: something move around, And.

432
00:24:42,920 --> 00:24:45,320
Speaker 2: It is the sort of thing that certainly during the

433
00:24:45,560 --> 00:24:48,359
Speaker 2: time period which this film was made, you could not

434
00:24:48,400 --> 00:24:50,880
Speaker 2: have done anything like this with a live action film,

435
00:24:50,920 --> 00:24:54,480
Speaker 2: and even today with computer effects, like maybe if you

436
00:24:54,560 --> 00:24:57,720
Speaker 2: had a big enough budget, you could do something along

437
00:24:57,760 --> 00:24:59,560
Speaker 2: the lines of this, but I don't know. I don't

438
00:24:59,560 --> 00:25:02,600
Speaker 2: think any wouldn't still still wouldn't be as good. But

439
00:25:02,600 --> 00:25:05,080
Speaker 2: but yeah, yeah, because we're not just talking about oh,

440
00:25:05,080 --> 00:25:07,040
Speaker 2: here's the here's the shot of this plane flying and

441
00:25:07,080 --> 00:25:09,520
Speaker 2: then here's someone in it. Like you have these complex

442
00:25:10,680 --> 00:25:14,920
Speaker 2: fantasy aviation scenes in which people from one plane are boarding,

443
00:25:15,119 --> 00:25:18,240
Speaker 2: a forced boarding of another plane, you know, landing on

444
00:25:18,320 --> 00:25:23,680
Speaker 2: top of it, engaging in melee combat aboard the airplanes.

445
00:25:23,920 --> 00:25:26,399
Speaker 2: It's it's phenomenal. But yeah, you can look at the

446
00:25:26,480 --> 00:25:29,760
Speaker 2: various designs and there's each kingdom in Nasca. They have

447
00:25:29,760 --> 00:25:33,040
Speaker 2: their own sort of material culture and their planes have

448
00:25:33,119 --> 00:25:36,840
Speaker 2: distinct designs. World War Two aviation buffs especially, we'll see

449
00:25:36,840 --> 00:25:43,280
Speaker 2: the inspiration of various Luftwaffa designs that inform the Toolmikian

450
00:25:43,640 --> 00:25:48,199
Speaker 2: aircraft that you see. So yeah, clearly Miyazaki's love for

451
00:25:49,040 --> 00:25:54,000
Speaker 2: airplanes goes pretty deep. But also his love for natural

452
00:25:54,080 --> 00:25:58,040
Speaker 2: movements is pretty deep as well. Again, like when when

453
00:25:58,040 --> 00:26:02,800
Speaker 2: a person moves in one of these films, they move naturally,

454
00:26:02,840 --> 00:26:05,640
Speaker 2: they move like a human being does, and you see

455
00:26:05,640 --> 00:26:08,080
Speaker 2: this throughout me Asaki's work. I think a really strong

456
00:26:08,160 --> 00:26:11,160
Speaker 2: example of this you can find in the nineteen eighty

457
00:26:11,200 --> 00:26:14,800
Speaker 2: eight film My Neighbor Totoro's a a classic film of

458
00:26:14,840 --> 00:26:16,639
Speaker 2: his as well, if not a more famous one, just

459
00:26:16,680 --> 00:26:19,360
Speaker 2: because it has like the cute elements of it are

460
00:26:19,400 --> 00:26:23,840
Speaker 2: so overpowering that it's it's you latch onto it more

461
00:26:23,880 --> 00:26:27,080
Speaker 2: with your heart in a different way, it's it's a

462
00:26:27,119 --> 00:26:29,359
Speaker 2: film that very much speaks to the heart of a child,

463
00:26:29,640 --> 00:26:32,800
Speaker 2: doesn't engage in a lot of fantasy world building for

464
00:26:32,840 --> 00:26:34,800
Speaker 2: the most part, not on the same level as Nasica.

465
00:26:34,800 --> 00:26:38,159
Speaker 2: It does have a very interesting fantasy world in it.

466
00:26:39,400 --> 00:26:42,560
Speaker 2: But the thing I noticed most recently, and I really

467
00:26:42,640 --> 00:26:46,080
Speaker 2: was obsessing over when I rewatched it recently, was the

468
00:26:46,119 --> 00:26:49,680
Speaker 2: attention to detail concerning the manner and movements of children.

469
00:26:50,240 --> 00:26:53,720
Speaker 2: It's just spectacular to behold because you know, how would

470
00:26:53,760 --> 00:26:55,840
Speaker 2: you have a character move from point A to point

471
00:26:55,840 --> 00:26:58,240
Speaker 2: B in a scene? Okay, there might be a specific

472
00:26:58,320 --> 00:27:01,240
Speaker 2: answer for that, and then how might you envision a

473
00:27:01,359 --> 00:27:04,480
Speaker 2: child doing it? And how would they do it accurately

474
00:27:04,560 --> 00:27:08,359
Speaker 2: with no regard for budget or time, just so you

475
00:27:08,440 --> 00:27:11,520
Speaker 2: have like all these wild and unnecessary flourishes that go

476
00:27:11,560 --> 00:27:15,880
Speaker 2: into their movement, these strange decisions that children make, like oh,

477
00:27:15,880 --> 00:27:17,920
Speaker 2: I'm supposed to take my shoes off, so my feet

478
00:27:17,920 --> 00:27:20,760
Speaker 2: are dirty, I'm just gonna walk on my hands with

479
00:27:20,760 --> 00:27:22,679
Speaker 2: my feet in the air. That sort of thing, Like

480
00:27:23,440 --> 00:27:28,160
Speaker 2: things that an adult might not realize unless they're actively

481
00:27:28,200 --> 00:27:31,320
Speaker 2: watching the children and figuring out what they are and

482
00:27:31,359 --> 00:27:35,320
Speaker 2: how they move, and then having the determination to make

483
00:27:35,359 --> 00:27:37,720
Speaker 2: sure that that is reflected in the film.

484
00:27:37,920 --> 00:27:40,240
Speaker 3: That's beautifully put. I think that's exactly right. And well,

485
00:27:40,280 --> 00:27:42,840
Speaker 3: it's less about movement. There's one moment in the film

486
00:27:42,840 --> 00:27:46,560
Speaker 3: that stood out as amazing child behavior, which is when

487
00:27:46,640 --> 00:27:51,680
Speaker 3: several characters are about to be taken hostage by a violent, threatening,

488
00:27:51,760 --> 00:27:56,640
Speaker 3: invading army and the children are saying goodbye and give

489
00:27:56,680 --> 00:27:59,320
Speaker 3: them as a parting gift, give them some nuts.

490
00:28:00,080 --> 00:28:05,560
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's so good. Now again, I can't give Miyazaki

491
00:28:06,160 --> 00:28:08,879
Speaker 2: full coverage here. There have been great documentaries about him,

492
00:28:08,920 --> 00:28:11,080
Speaker 2: but his work as an animator goes back to their

493
00:28:11,119 --> 00:28:13,920
Speaker 2: early to mid nineteen sixties, and then in seventy one

494
00:28:13,920 --> 00:28:17,000
Speaker 2: and seventy two we see him transition into some directorial duties.

495
00:28:17,440 --> 00:28:20,160
Speaker 2: Also in seventy two we see his first writing credits

496
00:28:20,560 --> 00:28:26,120
Speaker 2: on Seo Takahata's Panda Go Panda, which is pretty fun

497
00:28:26,119 --> 00:28:29,240
Speaker 2: if you can find it. This is for young children,

498
00:28:29,400 --> 00:28:32,840
Speaker 2: and it's pretty it's pretty great, like a kid and

499
00:28:32,880 --> 00:28:36,160
Speaker 2: her friend that is a giant panda. As a director,

500
00:28:36,400 --> 00:28:39,520
Speaker 2: Miyazaki started off doing something like fifteen episodes of Loop

501
00:28:39,560 --> 00:28:41,640
Speaker 2: in the third as well as twenty six episodes of

502
00:28:41,680 --> 00:28:45,080
Speaker 2: Future Boy Conan, and then a couple of Loop and movies.

503
00:28:45,560 --> 00:28:47,920
Speaker 2: And then in nineteen eighty four he wrote and directed

504
00:28:48,000 --> 00:28:50,720
Speaker 2: NAUSICAA of the Valley of the Wind based on his

505
00:28:50,760 --> 00:28:54,680
Speaker 2: manga of the same name. It would prove a huge

506
00:28:54,720 --> 00:28:58,760
Speaker 2: hit that in turn spawned the creation of Studio Ghibli.

507
00:28:59,240 --> 00:29:03,240
Speaker 2: Now fun note on Studio Ghibli. It is named after

508
00:29:03,520 --> 00:29:07,560
Speaker 2: the Libyan Arabic nickname for a World War II Italian aircraft,

509
00:29:08,520 --> 00:29:12,560
Speaker 2: again the aviation love in Miyazaki, but it means there

510
00:29:12,600 --> 00:29:20,240
Speaker 2: are three technically correct pronunciations for Ghibli, one in Libyan Arabic,

511
00:29:20,560 --> 00:29:23,000
Speaker 2: one in the Italian usage of it is a nickname

512
00:29:23,000 --> 00:29:25,400
Speaker 2: for an airplane, and then the Japanese usage of it.

513
00:29:25,520 --> 00:29:28,760
Speaker 2: So like the way you hear Japanese speakers like Miyazaki

514
00:29:28,840 --> 00:29:32,480
Speaker 2: himself pronounced Ghibli is different than what I'm saying now,

515
00:29:32,880 --> 00:29:35,880
Speaker 2: but I believe Ghibli as I'm saying it has become

516
00:29:35,960 --> 00:29:43,200
Speaker 2: sort of the standard Ish English pronunciation. So you know,

517
00:29:43,080 --> 00:29:47,680
Speaker 2: your opinion may differ, but there's suffice to say you

518
00:29:47,720 --> 00:29:49,640
Speaker 2: can you have some choices if you want to get

519
00:29:49,640 --> 00:29:50,239
Speaker 2: fancy with it.

520
00:29:50,720 --> 00:29:53,040
Speaker 3: This is a good thing to have strong opinions about.

521
00:29:54,520 --> 00:29:56,680
Speaker 2: I mean, their whole videos about it. But at any rate,

522
00:29:56,720 --> 00:30:00,600
Speaker 2: the success of this film allows them to form stud Ghibli.

523
00:30:01,800 --> 00:30:09,160
Speaker 2: He founds it with director is Takahata and producer Toshio Suzuki,

524
00:30:09,520 --> 00:30:13,120
Speaker 2: and they acquire the assets of a company called top Craft.

525
00:30:13,480 --> 00:30:16,200
Speaker 2: And if top Craft sounds familiar, it's because they're the

526
00:30:16,240 --> 00:30:19,200
Speaker 2: company that worked with Rankin in bass on seventy seven's

527
00:30:19,240 --> 00:30:21,240
Speaker 2: The Hobbit, nineteen eighty is The Return of the King,

528
00:30:21,600 --> 00:30:24,800
Speaker 2: and the eighty two films The Last Unicorn and The

529
00:30:24,800 --> 00:30:28,160
Speaker 2: Flight of Dragons. The Flight of Dragons is a film

530
00:30:28,200 --> 00:30:32,440
Speaker 2: that seth Nicholas Johnson discussed with me on an episode

531
00:30:32,440 --> 00:30:36,959
Speaker 2: of Weird House Cinema. Is Takahata, by the way, he

532
00:30:37,000 --> 00:30:39,960
Speaker 2: also is known for multiple films and a couple of

533
00:30:40,120 --> 00:30:44,120
Speaker 2: particularly excellent ones, nineteen eighty eight's Grave of the Fireflies,

534
00:30:44,520 --> 00:30:48,000
Speaker 2: and oh a film titled Palm Poco from nineteen ninety

535
00:30:48,000 --> 00:30:52,120
Speaker 2: four which is about Tanuki's and there so you have

536
00:30:52,160 --> 00:30:55,280
Speaker 2: a lot of like scrotal magic in that film. But

537
00:30:55,320 --> 00:30:58,160
Speaker 2: it is very much a film for I mean, kids

538
00:30:58,160 --> 00:31:00,440
Speaker 2: can watch it. It's it's very enjoyable It has a

539
00:31:00,520 --> 00:31:03,880
Speaker 2: very strong environmental message as well. You'll find that on

540
00:31:03,920 --> 00:31:08,720
Speaker 2: your streaming channels as well, alongside Studio Ghibli Fair. It

541
00:31:08,760 --> 00:31:11,520
Speaker 2: has a great English dub of Believe. Clancy Brown is

542
00:31:11,560 --> 00:31:13,960
Speaker 2: one of the many talents that is on that dub,

543
00:31:14,440 --> 00:31:17,440
Speaker 2: and yeah, it's really good. He also did a film

544
00:31:17,800 --> 00:31:21,400
Speaker 2: titled The Tale of the Princess Kaguya from twenty thirteen.

545
00:31:21,440 --> 00:31:23,600
Speaker 2: That was his last film before he died, but it's

546
00:31:23,600 --> 00:31:26,640
Speaker 2: great to anyway, back to Nyazaki, Miyazaki would follow up

547
00:31:26,680 --> 00:31:29,920
Speaker 2: Nasaca with a whole list of highly influential films. Nineteen

548
00:31:29,920 --> 00:31:32,640
Speaker 2: eighty six's Castle in the Sky, which seems to be

549
00:31:32,680 --> 00:31:34,880
Speaker 2: the same world as that of Nausaka. It has the

550
00:31:34,920 --> 00:31:38,960
Speaker 2: same fox squirrel that pops up in it. Nineteen eighty

551
00:31:38,960 --> 00:31:42,240
Speaker 2: eight's My Neighbor Totoro, eighty nine's Kiki's Delivery Service, which

552
00:31:42,320 --> 00:31:46,680
Speaker 2: is another favorite in My household, nineteen ninety two's Porco Rosso,

553
00:31:46,760 --> 00:31:50,880
Speaker 2: which is a pig fighter pilot film, ninety seven's Princess

554
00:31:50,880 --> 00:31:55,640
Speaker 2: Mononok two thousand and one Spirited Away. Another masterpiece two

555
00:31:55,640 --> 00:31:58,640
Speaker 2: thousand and four is Howl's Moving Castle, which is also amazing.

556
00:31:58,720 --> 00:32:02,320
Speaker 2: Two thousand and eight's Ponyo, twenty thirteen's The Wind Rises,

557
00:32:02,560 --> 00:32:06,000
Speaker 2: and twenty twenty threes The Boy and the Heron. This

558
00:32:06,040 --> 00:32:09,240
Speaker 2: is intended to be Miyazaki's final film, though we should

559
00:32:09,240 --> 00:32:12,480
Speaker 2: note that he previously retired in twenty thirteen. I don't

560
00:32:12,520 --> 00:32:16,280
Speaker 2: know if the man will ever truly stop making things,

561
00:32:16,280 --> 00:32:20,440
Speaker 2: because throughout that initial period of retirement he just kept working.

562
00:32:20,440 --> 00:32:25,280
Speaker 2: He did some shorts for the Ghibli Museum and so forth,

563
00:32:25,800 --> 00:32:27,640
Speaker 2: and then elsewhere in his career. He also did some

564
00:32:27,720 --> 00:32:30,720
Speaker 2: TV directing, he did some commercials, and he even did

565
00:32:30,720 --> 00:32:32,400
Speaker 2: some music videos. I don't think I've seen any of

566
00:32:32,400 --> 00:32:34,360
Speaker 2: the music videos he did, but there's at least one

567
00:32:34,400 --> 00:32:38,120
Speaker 2: with like some sort of angelic being in it. Now.

568
00:32:38,160 --> 00:32:41,400
Speaker 2: As we've already alluded to here, The Warriors of the

569
00:32:41,440 --> 00:32:45,400
Speaker 2: Wind NAUSICAA had a pretty rough start in North America.

570
00:32:45,640 --> 00:32:48,920
Speaker 2: It was initially dubbed and cut by Manson International and

571
00:32:48,960 --> 00:32:52,840
Speaker 2: Showman Ink, and then distributed by New World Pictures, which

572
00:32:53,000 --> 00:32:54,920
Speaker 2: was a Corman Brothers company. H.

573
00:32:55,160 --> 00:32:58,120
Speaker 3: Roger Yeah, yeah, Well, I don't know if he had

574
00:32:58,120 --> 00:33:00,760
Speaker 3: anything to do with it, but come on, you can't

575
00:33:00,800 --> 00:33:01,400
Speaker 3: do this.

576
00:33:03,320 --> 00:33:06,680
Speaker 2: So yeah. Retitled Warriors of the Wind, released in eighty five.

577
00:33:08,080 --> 00:33:10,040
Speaker 2: You know cut down in an attempt to make it

578
00:33:10,080 --> 00:33:13,719
Speaker 2: more appealing to North American children, roughly twenty two minutes

579
00:33:13,760 --> 00:33:18,040
Speaker 2: cut and the voice actors were allegedly not given much

580
00:33:18,080 --> 00:33:20,440
Speaker 2: to go on. So it's supposedly not a great dub.

581
00:33:21,280 --> 00:33:24,200
Speaker 2: And yeah, you can look at that ridiculous poster art

582
00:33:24,240 --> 00:33:25,880
Speaker 2: and it kind of tells you everything you need to know.

583
00:33:26,400 --> 00:33:27,920
Speaker 3: I don't know if this is true, but I just

584
00:33:28,040 --> 00:33:31,400
Speaker 3: read in comments and stuff on the internet the allegation that,

585
00:33:31,560 --> 00:33:34,320
Speaker 3: like the voice actors didn't know what the story was,

586
00:33:34,400 --> 00:33:36,680
Speaker 3: they were just sort of like given lines blind and

587
00:33:36,800 --> 00:33:37,680
Speaker 3: like hear read this.

588
00:33:38,320 --> 00:33:43,320
Speaker 2: Yeah, so a very substandard dub for a superb film.

589
00:33:43,640 --> 00:33:47,520
Speaker 2: New World Pictures would hold those rights until nineteen ninety five. Now,

590
00:33:47,840 --> 00:33:49,840
Speaker 2: if you want more information about the words of the

591
00:33:49,840 --> 00:33:52,720
Speaker 2: wind cut, there's a nice little article from James Lapierre.

592
00:33:53,200 --> 00:33:56,280
Speaker 2: You can find this on the blog Cinema Thieck, pointing

593
00:33:56,400 --> 00:34:00,720
Speaker 2: out that it made Niyazaki very touchy about cut in general,

594
00:34:00,720 --> 00:34:02,160
Speaker 2: and rightfully so.

595
00:34:02,160 --> 00:34:02,240
Speaker 3: So.

596
00:34:02,360 --> 00:34:05,480
Speaker 2: When Princess Mononoke was a huge hit in nineteen ninety seven,

597
00:34:06,600 --> 00:34:11,080
Speaker 2: Miramax Films then CEO Harvey Weinstein made a pitch to

598
00:34:11,120 --> 00:34:14,399
Speaker 2: release it in North America, but with heavy cuts once

599
00:34:14,480 --> 00:34:17,480
Speaker 2: more to make it supposedly appealing to that North American

600
00:34:17,560 --> 00:34:20,680
Speaker 2: children's audience. Miyazaki was offended. He walked out of the

601
00:34:20,719 --> 00:34:25,400
Speaker 2: meeting and studio Ghibli then sent Weinstein a Samurai sword

602
00:34:25,440 --> 00:34:28,040
Speaker 2: with a note that read no cuts, and it was

603
00:34:28,320 --> 00:34:29,960
Speaker 2: indeed released unedited.

604
00:34:30,640 --> 00:34:31,320
Speaker 3: That's a story.

605
00:34:32,000 --> 00:34:35,960
Speaker 2: Yeah, So in nineteen ninety six, Disney had made a

606
00:34:36,000 --> 00:34:39,600
Speaker 2: deal to become the North American distributors of Ghibli films,

607
00:34:39,600 --> 00:34:43,440
Speaker 2: including Princess Mononoke. Miramax was a subsidiary of Disney at

608
00:34:43,480 --> 00:34:47,200
Speaker 2: the time, Thus that whole situation, and it wasn't long

609
00:34:47,239 --> 00:34:49,759
Speaker 2: before they put in motion plans for a new faithful

610
00:34:49,840 --> 00:34:53,160
Speaker 2: no cuts dub of the film. And yeah, this is

611
00:34:53,200 --> 00:34:56,600
Speaker 2: the one that we watched. So if you were watching,

612
00:34:56,640 --> 00:34:59,560
Speaker 2: if you watch this film with an English dub prior

613
00:34:59,800 --> 00:35:03,160
Speaker 2: to this, to the belief what two thousand and five,

614
00:35:04,400 --> 00:35:07,560
Speaker 2: then you probably watched The Warriors of the Wind.

615
00:35:08,000 --> 00:35:10,839
Speaker 3: So essentially you haven't seen the whole movie, like you're

616
00:35:10,880 --> 00:35:13,120
Speaker 3: missing about a fifth of it or something.

617
00:35:13,840 --> 00:35:17,640
Speaker 2: Right. Oh and by the way, the manga is a

618
00:35:18,040 --> 00:35:20,399
Speaker 2: which I own and I haven't read all of it yet,

619
00:35:20,800 --> 00:35:26,280
Speaker 2: but it is a great like two volume compendium of Nausica.

620
00:35:26,320 --> 00:35:29,520
Speaker 2: It's in black and white with some colored illustrations and maps.

621
00:35:30,080 --> 00:35:33,279
Speaker 2: The movie only adapts the first sixteen chapters, so that's

622
00:35:33,280 --> 00:35:36,200
Speaker 2: something like not even half of the first book. So

623
00:35:36,239 --> 00:35:38,719
Speaker 2: there's a lot more from the world of Nasca out

624
00:35:38,760 --> 00:35:39,800
Speaker 2: there if you're intrigued.

625
00:35:40,120 --> 00:35:44,600
Speaker 3: You shared a map from this manga with me and

626
00:35:44,640 --> 00:35:46,040
Speaker 3: I was looking at it and I was like, oh,

627
00:35:46,120 --> 00:35:50,880
Speaker 3: interesting that, like it's showing two different oceans nearly meeting.

628
00:35:50,920 --> 00:35:53,359
Speaker 3: But then what I realized is that there is one

629
00:35:53,360 --> 00:35:55,200
Speaker 3: thing on the map that is a body of water.

630
00:35:55,280 --> 00:35:58,400
Speaker 3: It is the Acid Lake from the movie. There's another

631
00:35:58,440 --> 00:36:02,080
Speaker 3: thing on the map that is called the See of Decay,

632
00:36:02,320 --> 00:36:06,000
Speaker 3: And I realized later that is a translation issue because

633
00:36:06,520 --> 00:36:09,480
Speaker 3: what is called the See of Decay in the manga,

634
00:36:09,600 --> 00:36:14,040
Speaker 3: and I believe in the English subtitles of the Japanese

635
00:36:14,440 --> 00:36:17,719
Speaker 3: that is what's called the Toxic Jungle in the dub

636
00:36:17,760 --> 00:36:18,360
Speaker 3: we watched.

637
00:36:18,440 --> 00:36:21,440
Speaker 2: Is that right, Yes, that's correct, And I think there

638
00:36:21,440 --> 00:36:23,600
Speaker 2: are additional details like those where things are a little

639
00:36:23,600 --> 00:36:25,840
Speaker 2: bit different from the manga to the movie, from the

640
00:36:25,880 --> 00:36:29,520
Speaker 2: Japanese to the English. But you know, for the most part,

641
00:36:29,920 --> 00:36:31,719
Speaker 2: it seems like a pretty great translation.

642
00:36:32,120 --> 00:36:34,640
Speaker 3: But that does make me almost. It does make me

643
00:36:34,719 --> 00:36:37,279
Speaker 3: curious to go back and watch the version with the subtitles,

644
00:36:37,320 --> 00:36:40,560
Speaker 3: because there's I don't know, there's so much pleasure in

645
00:36:40,680 --> 00:36:44,520
Speaker 3: the film already, that's little nuances of language, and that

646
00:36:44,600 --> 00:36:46,600
Speaker 3: was just in the dubbed version, So I want to

647
00:36:46,640 --> 00:36:48,480
Speaker 3: see what other options are available to.

648
00:36:49,400 --> 00:36:52,480
Speaker 2: Yeah, I was tempted to do the subtitled version this

649
00:36:52,560 --> 00:36:54,160
Speaker 2: time when I thought I was going to watch it

650
00:36:54,200 --> 00:36:56,920
Speaker 2: by myself, but I ended up watching it rewatching it

651
00:36:57,000 --> 00:36:59,520
Speaker 2: with my family, and so we did the We did

652
00:36:59,600 --> 00:37:02,359
Speaker 2: the dub, and it was a lot of fun, all right.

653
00:37:02,440 --> 00:37:05,200
Speaker 2: So at this point I would typically go in a

654
00:37:05,239 --> 00:37:07,400
Speaker 2: lot deeper on the cast. I'm not really going to

655
00:37:07,440 --> 00:37:11,520
Speaker 2: do that with this episode, but I do want to

656
00:37:11,600 --> 00:37:16,200
Speaker 2: just briefly go over like four main characters, and we're

657
00:37:16,200 --> 00:37:20,040
Speaker 2: going to start with Nausica. NAUSICAA in the original Japanese

658
00:37:20,120 --> 00:37:24,120
Speaker 2: cut was voiced by Sumi Shiamoto born nineteen fifty four,

659
00:37:24,160 --> 00:37:27,640
Speaker 2: a veteran Japanese voice actor with credits from nineteen seventy

660
00:37:27,680 --> 00:37:31,000
Speaker 2: nine till today. I believe she's still active. The Disney

661
00:37:31,120 --> 00:37:34,720
Speaker 2: voice talent again from two thousand and five is Alison

662
00:37:34,800 --> 00:37:39,120
Speaker 2: Lohman born nineteen seventy nine American actor now retired. I

663
00:37:39,120 --> 00:37:43,439
Speaker 2: think mostly did like independent type roles, and I think

664
00:37:43,480 --> 00:37:45,719
Speaker 2: this might be her only animation gig. I could be

665
00:37:45,760 --> 00:37:48,560
Speaker 2: wrong on that, but she's notable for being in two

666
00:37:48,560 --> 00:37:51,120
Speaker 2: thousand and two is White Oleander, two thousand and threes

667
00:37:51,120 --> 00:37:53,839
Speaker 2: Big Fish, and two thousand and nine's Drag Me to Hell. Yeah.

668
00:37:53,840 --> 00:37:57,200
Speaker 3: I remember her from Drag Me to Hell. She has

669
00:37:57,200 --> 00:37:58,560
Speaker 3: to act opposite a goat heead.

670
00:37:58,600 --> 00:38:02,759
Speaker 2: I believe that's the film where people get dragged to hell, right,

671
00:38:02,840 --> 00:38:06,239
Speaker 2: like straight through the floor. Yeah, pretty much. Okay, they

672
00:38:06,239 --> 00:38:08,359
Speaker 2: should have named it Don't Get Dragged to Hell.

673
00:38:09,480 --> 00:38:13,200
Speaker 3: That's right. But you know what, she's great as Nausica. Yeah,

674
00:38:13,239 --> 00:38:13,680
Speaker 3: really good.

675
00:38:14,080 --> 00:38:16,640
Speaker 2: I agree. She puts so much emotion into this performance.

676
00:38:16,680 --> 00:38:19,640
Speaker 2: It's it's perfect, all right. We mentioned lord Yupa already

677
00:38:20,160 --> 00:38:24,520
Speaker 2: in the original Japanese audio voice by Goro Naya, who

678
00:38:24,560 --> 00:38:28,480
Speaker 2: lived nineteen twenty nine through twenty thirteen, Japanese actor and

679
00:38:28,560 --> 00:38:30,760
Speaker 2: voice actor who had also worked on the Loop and movies.

680
00:38:31,120 --> 00:38:33,680
Speaker 2: But in the Disney dub it is the voice of

681
00:38:33,800 --> 00:38:35,759
Speaker 2: Patrick Stewart born nineteen.

682
00:38:35,480 --> 00:38:38,360
Speaker 3: Forty really inspired casting choice.

683
00:38:38,360 --> 00:38:41,480
Speaker 2: He's perfect, absolutely any I don't need to tell you

684
00:38:41,480 --> 00:38:43,560
Speaker 2: who Patrick Stewart is. You know. This is Captain John

685
00:38:43,640 --> 00:38:47,000
Speaker 2: Luke McCard. This is Professor Xavier. This is Walter Blutt

686
00:38:47,000 --> 00:38:50,800
Speaker 2: from Blunt Talk. This is Gerney Halleck from David Lynch's Dune.

687
00:38:51,040 --> 00:38:53,480
Speaker 2: This is the Erotic Bakery owner from that one Saturday

688
00:38:53,560 --> 00:38:56,080
Speaker 2: Night Live sketch. So I have a feeling we'll come

689
00:38:56,120 --> 00:38:58,640
Speaker 2: back to Patrick Stewart in the future on Weird House.

690
00:38:58,480 --> 00:39:01,960
Speaker 3: Cinema when we do the episode on David Lynch's Dune.

691
00:39:02,040 --> 00:39:04,759
Speaker 2: I think I think that would be that would make

692
00:39:04,800 --> 00:39:07,040
Speaker 2: for a good episode because, yeah, there's a lot of

693
00:39:07,080 --> 00:39:10,720
Speaker 2: great stuff, a lot of weird stuff, some questionable choices.

694
00:39:10,520 --> 00:39:12,600
Speaker 3: Scenes where he's going into battle holding a pug.

695
00:39:13,200 --> 00:39:20,200
Speaker 2: Yeah, there's some great performances. There are some strange performances

696
00:39:20,239 --> 00:39:24,560
Speaker 2: from great actors. It's it's a mass It's wonderful, all right.

697
00:39:24,560 --> 00:39:27,960
Speaker 2: We have a character named Aspol. This is this is

698
00:39:28,320 --> 00:39:31,319
Speaker 2: kind of like a male side character that you know,

699
00:39:31,360 --> 00:39:35,280
Speaker 2: you can imagine that some of those North American producers

700
00:39:35,280 --> 00:39:38,480
Speaker 2: saying like, why isn't this our hero? Why why is

701
00:39:38,520 --> 00:39:40,520
Speaker 2: it the girl? We want? The boy is the hero?

702
00:39:40,640 --> 00:39:42,480
Speaker 3: He's a boy. Put him in the middle of the poster.

703
00:39:42,760 --> 00:39:45,440
Speaker 2: Yeah, why does he have a supporting role? But he's

704
00:39:45,440 --> 00:39:48,400
Speaker 2: still an important character that The Japanese voice talent was

705
00:39:48,480 --> 00:39:52,640
Speaker 2: Yoji Matsuda born in sixty seven, as a Japanese voice

706
00:39:52,680 --> 00:39:56,160
Speaker 2: actor who's also in Princess mononok. The American voice talent

707
00:39:56,320 --> 00:39:59,719
Speaker 2: is Shila Boof born nineteen eighty six. This is back

708
00:39:59,760 --> 00:40:01,520
Speaker 2: when and he was mostly known as like a kid

709
00:40:01,640 --> 00:40:04,680
Speaker 2: youth actor. This dub was made the same year that

710
00:40:04,719 --> 00:40:07,680
Speaker 2: he was in the Keanu Reeves adaptation of Constantine.

711
00:40:08,200 --> 00:40:10,760
Speaker 3: Oh but can you imagine if they had gotten Keanu

712
00:40:10,800 --> 00:40:11,919
Speaker 3: Reeves for this role.

713
00:40:13,680 --> 00:40:16,440
Speaker 2: I mean, hmm, I don't know. I have to think

714
00:40:16,440 --> 00:40:18,839
Speaker 2: about that. Ask me about that later when I've had

715
00:40:18,840 --> 00:40:21,359
Speaker 2: time to reflect. Okay, you've been a little too old

716
00:40:21,360 --> 00:40:21,600
Speaker 2: for it.

717
00:40:21,600 --> 00:40:23,400
Speaker 3: I guess this is supposed to be like a character

718
00:40:23,400 --> 00:40:26,360
Speaker 3: around the same age as Nausaca, right, like late teens maybe?

719
00:40:26,719 --> 00:40:30,800
Speaker 2: Yeah, so this is when when when Laboufe was was

720
00:40:31,000 --> 00:40:34,680
Speaker 2: was pretty young. But yeah, I'm Reeves will have to

721
00:40:34,680 --> 00:40:36,960
Speaker 2: come back. Maybe we'll watch a Keanu Reeves film at

722
00:40:36,960 --> 00:40:41,040
Speaker 2: some point, because that's an interesting career trajectory. I believe

723
00:40:41,080 --> 00:40:44,600
Speaker 2: there is a he's a performer that's that's matured like

724
00:40:44,640 --> 00:40:48,239
Speaker 2: a whine to a large extent. But then again, I

725
00:40:48,280 --> 00:40:48,640
Speaker 2: don't know.

726
00:40:48,680 --> 00:40:51,960
Speaker 3: Maybe you go back and you watch Francis Ford Coppolas

727
00:40:52,040 --> 00:40:55,120
Speaker 3: Dracula and you notice things about him that you didn't before.

728
00:40:55,800 --> 00:40:58,760
Speaker 2: Maybe, Yeah, I don't know. That's that's that'll be the challenge,

729
00:40:58,840 --> 00:41:01,040
Speaker 2: Like where do you dip in to the I mean,

730
00:41:01,080 --> 00:41:02,400
Speaker 2: I guess you got to go early for some of

731
00:41:02,440 --> 00:41:05,359
Speaker 2: the weirdest stuff. I will return to you, my love.

732
00:41:07,600 --> 00:41:11,040
Speaker 2: All right. The next character we're gonna mention, and this

733
00:41:11,120 --> 00:41:12,719
Speaker 2: is the I think the last one we're gonna mention

734
00:41:12,800 --> 00:41:16,320
Speaker 2: in casting detail. Here here is the character of Kashana.

735
00:41:16,960 --> 00:41:23,640
Speaker 2: Kashana is essentially the villain of the piece, but it's complicated, Yeah,

736
00:41:23,680 --> 00:41:27,600
Speaker 2: because the thing about Miyazaki films is there's rarely a

737
00:41:27,920 --> 00:41:31,440
Speaker 2: like pure cinematic villain. I think the closest you get

738
00:41:31,520 --> 00:41:35,279
Speaker 2: is in Castle in the Sky. But here we have

739
00:41:35,320 --> 00:41:38,000
Speaker 2: a character that does largely line up with the idea

740
00:41:38,000 --> 00:41:40,759
Speaker 2: of a villain and expectations of a villain, you know.

741
00:41:41,520 --> 00:41:44,239
Speaker 2: But she's still defined and presented in such a way

742
00:41:44,239 --> 00:41:46,560
Speaker 2: that we understand where she's coming from to some degree.

743
00:41:46,640 --> 00:41:49,760
Speaker 2: She's we can we can relate to her on some level.

744
00:41:50,120 --> 00:41:53,480
Speaker 2: She's a warrior princess fighting for a nation's survival, and

745
00:41:54,680 --> 00:41:58,080
Speaker 2: underlying all this determination and rage that we see, we

746
00:41:58,239 --> 00:42:02,120
Speaker 2: also glimpse deep trunk and fear, so we understand like

747
00:42:02,160 --> 00:42:05,879
Speaker 2: a lot of what's informing what she's putting out there.

748
00:42:06,280 --> 00:42:09,080
Speaker 3: I think the temptation with a villain is always to

749
00:42:09,200 --> 00:42:14,400
Speaker 3: make them sadistic, to make them take pleasure in causing

750
00:42:14,440 --> 00:42:18,000
Speaker 3: other people pain, because I think in most movies that

751
00:42:18,040 --> 00:42:20,840
Speaker 3: sort of flips the switch that makes it feel okay

752
00:42:20,920 --> 00:42:23,040
Speaker 3: when the hero who's supposed to be a good guy

753
00:42:23,160 --> 00:42:25,200
Speaker 3: just kills them or lets them fall off a cliff

754
00:42:25,239 --> 00:42:28,480
Speaker 3: at the end, it's because they were needlessly sadistic. You

755
00:42:28,520 --> 00:42:31,640
Speaker 3: know that you can deal with them brutally and it's

756
00:42:31,680 --> 00:42:35,920
Speaker 3: all right. She I don't think, is needlessly sadistic, though

757
00:42:35,960 --> 00:42:38,440
Speaker 3: she does do a lot of cruel things. They are

758
00:42:38,520 --> 00:42:40,960
Speaker 3: things that she thinks she has to do.

759
00:42:41,760 --> 00:42:46,120
Speaker 2: Yeah, exactly. So she's a very fascinating character and a

760
00:42:46,200 --> 00:42:50,759
Speaker 2: solid villain presence in the film. The Japanese voice talent

761
00:42:50,840 --> 00:42:55,160
Speaker 2: here is Yoshiko Sakaki Bara born nineteen fifty six, another

762
00:42:55,239 --> 00:42:58,279
Speaker 2: Japanese voice actor with a ton of credits. She also

763
00:42:58,360 --> 00:43:00,759
Speaker 2: voiced the puppet Master in Ghost in the Shell two

764
00:43:00,800 --> 00:43:03,360
Speaker 2: point zero. I think that's the one that has a

765
00:43:03,360 --> 00:43:05,760
Speaker 2: bassot hound in it. Maybe they both have bassot hounds

766
00:43:05,760 --> 00:43:07,759
Speaker 2: in them. Oh weird.

767
00:43:08,239 --> 00:43:10,759
Speaker 3: I have occasion to say the words basset hound later

768
00:43:10,800 --> 00:43:11,480
Speaker 3: in this episode.

769
00:43:11,880 --> 00:43:16,240
Speaker 2: Oh okay. The American voice talent here from the Disney

770
00:43:16,280 --> 00:43:20,120
Speaker 2: cut is Uma Thurman born nineteen seventy. She's great in

771
00:43:20,200 --> 00:43:23,560
Speaker 2: this role, I think so. Yes. I think she brings

772
00:43:23,640 --> 00:43:29,279
Speaker 2: all the appropriate levels to this performance, and I think

773
00:43:29,320 --> 00:43:31,240
Speaker 2: it lines up with the kind of roles that she's

774
00:43:32,080 --> 00:43:34,440
Speaker 2: built her career off of. She's had a ton of

775
00:43:34,440 --> 00:43:36,960
Speaker 2: great roles over the years, a ton of not great

776
00:43:37,040 --> 00:43:40,920
Speaker 2: but highly entertaining roles. She's always had a knack for playing,

777
00:43:41,040 --> 00:43:44,360
Speaker 2: on one hand, action oriented characters as what but also

778
00:43:44,880 --> 00:43:49,600
Speaker 2: devious vixen's and fem fatales. She's played both Poison Ivy

779
00:43:49,600 --> 00:43:53,080
Speaker 2: from Batman and Medusa from Greek Mythology.

780
00:43:53,840 --> 00:43:55,919
Speaker 3: Sorry, I was just thinking about Poison Ivy. I mean,

781
00:43:56,360 --> 00:43:58,080
Speaker 3: that's an Oscar caliber role.

782
00:43:59,120 --> 00:44:03,839
Speaker 2: But you have to admit she's entertaining in it, So yeah,

783
00:44:04,080 --> 00:44:06,920
Speaker 2: her range ultimately goes beyond all of that. I mean,

784
00:44:06,960 --> 00:44:09,279
Speaker 2: her filmography is a great mix of big budget fair

785
00:44:10,120 --> 00:44:13,520
Speaker 2: like Batman, movies and so forth, but also artsier films,

786
00:44:13,920 --> 00:44:15,759
Speaker 2: and you know, it's just a bit of trivia. She's

787
00:44:15,760 --> 00:44:19,600
Speaker 2: the daughter of American Buddhist author and academic Robert Thurman. Now,

788
00:44:19,640 --> 00:44:22,080
Speaker 2: the rest of the Disney dubcast includes some other great

789
00:44:22,080 --> 00:44:28,520
Speaker 2: performances by Chris Sarandon, Edward James Almos, Tres McNeil, Frank Welker,

790
00:44:28,760 --> 00:44:31,080
Speaker 2: Mark Hamill. He has a very fun role in this,

791
00:44:31,480 --> 00:44:33,160
Speaker 2: and at the very beginning you get a little bit

792
00:44:33,200 --> 00:44:38,040
Speaker 2: of narration from Tony j the late voice actor who

793
00:44:38,600 --> 00:44:42,560
Speaker 2: really good at dramatic narration and also occasionally the voice

794
00:44:42,600 --> 00:44:44,760
Speaker 2: of elder gods and so forth.

795
00:44:45,280 --> 00:44:49,160
Speaker 3: Actually, while talking about villains, you could argue that Chris

796
00:44:49,200 --> 00:44:52,200
Speaker 3: Sarandon's character is the more villainous of the two, even

797
00:44:52,200 --> 00:44:56,200
Speaker 3: though he's the lackey to her, like she's ultimately issuing

798
00:44:56,239 --> 00:44:59,560
Speaker 3: the more evil orders. But Chris Sarandon's character, I think

799
00:44:59,600 --> 00:45:02,719
Speaker 3: comes up is more just kind of a venal and

800
00:45:02,760 --> 00:45:04,120
Speaker 3: totally self interested.

801
00:45:04,920 --> 00:45:08,520
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, yeah, he's a real snake. Yeah, He's like,

802
00:45:08,640 --> 00:45:11,759
Speaker 2: is the has the princess died? Does it mean that

803
00:45:11,840 --> 00:45:15,560
Speaker 2: I'm going to finally rise to the throne? And then

804
00:45:15,840 --> 00:45:17,439
Speaker 2: she shows back on me. He's like, well, that dream

805
00:45:17,440 --> 00:45:23,000
Speaker 2: died pretty quickly. He's lazy but once to advance and

806
00:45:23,160 --> 00:45:26,680
Speaker 2: is kind of completely a moral in that direction. But

807
00:45:26,719 --> 00:45:28,600
Speaker 2: also he's only going to put in so much effort,

808
00:45:28,960 --> 00:45:31,440
Speaker 2: only going to stick his neck out so far exactly.

809
00:45:31,600 --> 00:45:32,080
Speaker 3: Yeah.

810
00:45:32,239 --> 00:45:35,560
Speaker 2: Finally, the music on this one is a composition by

811
00:45:35,719 --> 00:45:41,040
Speaker 2: Joe Hisashi born nineteen fifty, Japanese composer and musician, noted

812
00:45:41,040 --> 00:45:43,520
Speaker 2: for his work with Studio Ghibli and Miyazaki. In particular,

813
00:45:44,040 --> 00:45:48,200
Speaker 2: he scored all but one of Miyazaki's films, and that one,

814
00:45:48,239 --> 00:45:50,759
Speaker 2: I believe is nineteen seventy nine's Loop in the Third.

815
00:45:51,280 --> 00:45:54,600
Speaker 2: So like everything you think of instantly as Ghibli and

816
00:45:54,680 --> 00:45:57,680
Speaker 2: Miyazaki he has had a hand in. His work is

817
00:45:58,000 --> 00:46:00,279
Speaker 2: always great, and it's one of those things where you

818
00:46:00,320 --> 00:46:04,680
Speaker 2: can't separate his sound from the Azaki's visuals because they're

819
00:46:04,719 --> 00:46:09,640
Speaker 2: always together. But I especially love this score because I

820
00:46:09,640 --> 00:46:12,880
Speaker 2: think this is definitely the synthia and more experimental of

821
00:46:12,960 --> 00:46:16,680
Speaker 2: any of the scores from this composer that I've heard.

822
00:46:17,160 --> 00:46:19,680
Speaker 3: I didn't make notes of it at the time, but

823
00:46:20,040 --> 00:46:23,120
Speaker 3: it seems to me the style of musical themes throughout

824
00:46:23,160 --> 00:46:24,880
Speaker 3: the film is incredibly varied.

825
00:46:26,320 --> 00:46:29,160
Speaker 2: Yeah, I heard there's like an om theme that has

826
00:46:29,239 --> 00:46:31,440
Speaker 2: kind of a sitar kind of a quality to it.

827
00:46:32,239 --> 00:46:34,680
Speaker 2: There are some sort of harpsichord elements that kind of

828
00:46:34,680 --> 00:46:37,359
Speaker 2: have a medieval European vibe to them. I think when

829
00:46:37,400 --> 00:46:40,760
Speaker 2: we're encountering some of the kingdoms. There are other stretches

830
00:46:40,880 --> 00:46:44,000
Speaker 2: that are very synthy, and then the other parts of

831
00:46:44,000 --> 00:46:46,799
Speaker 2: it that are more like sweeping in traditional I think

832
00:46:46,800 --> 00:46:50,600
Speaker 2: that's right and catchy. There are some very catchy tunes

833
00:46:50,640 --> 00:46:53,239
Speaker 2: in it as well, so it's varied, but across the

834
00:46:53,280 --> 00:46:54,600
Speaker 2: board great score.

835
00:47:02,239 --> 00:47:04,239
Speaker 3: So this is the part of the episode where we

836
00:47:04,280 --> 00:47:07,160
Speaker 3: would usually do a plot recap. This is one of

837
00:47:07,160 --> 00:47:09,600
Speaker 3: those films where I think it would not feel right

838
00:47:09,760 --> 00:47:11,719
Speaker 3: at all to do that the kind of scene by

839
00:47:11,800 --> 00:47:15,640
Speaker 3: scene look, so instead, I want to take a different

840
00:47:15,719 --> 00:47:19,640
Speaker 3: tack here where I focus really intensely on the opening

841
00:47:20,120 --> 00:47:24,720
Speaker 3: and then we can give maybe a very light broad

842
00:47:24,760 --> 00:47:27,160
Speaker 3: synopsis and talk about some of the other major themes

843
00:47:27,160 --> 00:47:27,720
Speaker 3: and scenes.

844
00:47:28,360 --> 00:47:28,919
Speaker 2: Sounds good.

845
00:47:29,400 --> 00:47:32,320
Speaker 3: So again we're going to be talking about the uncut

846
00:47:32,400 --> 00:47:34,840
Speaker 3: version with the two thousand and five English voice cast,

847
00:47:34,960 --> 00:47:38,000
Speaker 3: But I want to look at the opening shots because

848
00:47:38,080 --> 00:47:42,080
Speaker 3: I think they tell a lot about the style of

849
00:47:42,120 --> 00:47:45,600
Speaker 3: the film. So at the very beginning, we hear wind blowing,

850
00:47:46,000 --> 00:47:50,440
Speaker 3: and the action opens on a barren, dusty landscape covered

851
00:47:50,480 --> 00:47:56,400
Speaker 3: with smooth, round speckled objects, so presumably smooth stones, but

852
00:47:56,440 --> 00:47:59,239
Speaker 3: they look almost like eggs. There is a haze on

853
00:47:59,280 --> 00:48:02,320
Speaker 3: the horizon and we again we hear the wind blowing,

854
00:48:02,640 --> 00:48:05,920
Speaker 3: and in the distance a pair of dark figures are

855
00:48:05,960 --> 00:48:09,600
Speaker 3: plodding toward us through the haze. Then there is a

856
00:48:09,680 --> 00:48:12,560
Speaker 3: close up of the feet of the figures that were

857
00:48:12,600 --> 00:48:15,680
Speaker 3: moving toward us as they cross the desert, and instead

858
00:48:15,719 --> 00:48:20,239
Speaker 3: of human feet, we see strange, cross shaped talons, like

859
00:48:20,280 --> 00:48:23,760
Speaker 3: the feet of an enormous bird tracking across the earth.

860
00:48:24,239 --> 00:48:27,520
Speaker 3: And all around we can now see inclose up what

861
00:48:27,640 --> 00:48:32,319
Speaker 3: looked like the round stones before. Instead they are spherical

862
00:48:32,480 --> 00:48:35,480
Speaker 3: white orbs plastered to the ground with a kind of

863
00:48:35,520 --> 00:48:39,920
Speaker 3: elastic matrix of fiber, like big egg sacks of spiders

864
00:48:39,960 --> 00:48:43,440
Speaker 3: wrapped in silk, And all around them are little tendrils

865
00:48:43,840 --> 00:48:47,560
Speaker 3: of an almost fuzzy texture, kind of like woolen fern shoots.

866
00:48:48,200 --> 00:48:50,879
Speaker 3: And then there's another shot. The two figures we saw

867
00:48:50,920 --> 00:48:53,920
Speaker 3: in the haze are enormous birds, like you might have

868
00:48:53,960 --> 00:48:57,960
Speaker 3: guessed from their talons, they're giant bipedal birds like EMUs

869
00:48:58,080 --> 00:49:02,520
Speaker 3: or rheas, except they are wearing masks over their faces,

870
00:49:02,640 --> 00:49:05,440
Speaker 3: masks that look like they're made of leather with glass

871
00:49:05,560 --> 00:49:09,360
Speaker 3: eye slots, kind of like World War One era gas masks.

872
00:49:09,920 --> 00:49:12,520
Speaker 3: And then stranger than that, one of the birds is

873
00:49:12,600 --> 00:49:16,040
Speaker 3: carrying a rider who's riding it like a horse, a

874
00:49:16,080 --> 00:49:18,400
Speaker 3: figure in the shape of a man draped in a

875
00:49:18,440 --> 00:49:22,320
Speaker 3: long cloak with a drooping, wide brimmed hat that I

876
00:49:22,320 --> 00:49:26,200
Speaker 3: would say is halfway between a samurai helmet and a sombrero.

877
00:49:27,160 --> 00:49:29,880
Speaker 3: And the rider is also wearing a mask like a

878
00:49:29,920 --> 00:49:33,560
Speaker 3: gas mask, with an elongated snout, so the mask makes

879
00:49:33,640 --> 00:49:37,160
Speaker 3: him look like a dog. And all three of these creatures,

880
00:49:37,160 --> 00:49:41,400
Speaker 3: the birds and the rider, their masks, have these floppy

881
00:49:41,520 --> 00:49:45,279
Speaker 3: appendages hanging off both sides of the snouts of the mask,

882
00:49:45,719 --> 00:49:47,600
Speaker 3: kind of like the snood of a turkey, if you

883
00:49:47,640 --> 00:49:50,560
Speaker 3: don't know that term, the snowed. You know, the sort

884
00:49:50,600 --> 00:49:53,799
Speaker 3: of flap of flesh that hangs down over the beak

885
00:49:53,840 --> 00:49:55,960
Speaker 3: of I think of a male turkey. And so they've

886
00:49:56,000 --> 00:49:58,480
Speaker 3: got these things hanging off the snouts, except they're not

887
00:49:58,520 --> 00:50:01,680
Speaker 3: exactly like a you know, like a like a turkey snood.

888
00:50:02,800 --> 00:50:07,000
Speaker 3: The floppy snoods are symmetrical and smooth, like the ears

889
00:50:07,239 --> 00:50:08,200
Speaker 3: of a basset hound.

890
00:50:09,040 --> 00:50:09,840
Speaker 2: All right, there you go.

891
00:50:10,560 --> 00:50:14,239
Speaker 3: Meanwhile, there are white particles like snowflakes falling through the

892
00:50:14,280 --> 00:50:16,600
Speaker 3: air all around. And then we cut to a point

893
00:50:16,600 --> 00:50:20,400
Speaker 3: of view of the rider as he moves through the desert,

894
00:50:20,600 --> 00:50:24,000
Speaker 3: and ahead of him are trees, but without leaves. They

895
00:50:24,040 --> 00:50:29,359
Speaker 3: are dead trunks lofting these dead black branches, and they're

896
00:50:29,360 --> 00:50:33,520
Speaker 3: completely covered in gigantic versions of the silk egg sacks

897
00:50:33,520 --> 00:50:36,160
Speaker 3: we saw dotting the ground below. So it's like a

898
00:50:36,239 --> 00:50:40,360
Speaker 3: forest that has been reduced to skeletons by a plague

899
00:50:40,400 --> 00:50:44,760
Speaker 3: of spider silk cotton ball tumors. Then in the distance,

900
00:50:44,840 --> 00:50:47,839
Speaker 3: through the trees, we see a windmill. It comes into view,

901
00:50:48,520 --> 00:50:51,120
Speaker 3: so now there's some kind of human habitation in this

902
00:50:51,239 --> 00:50:54,399
Speaker 3: cursed land. Then the rider and the two birds begin

903
00:50:54,480 --> 00:50:57,280
Speaker 3: to walk through the dead forest, and the giant cotton

904
00:50:57,320 --> 00:51:00,920
Speaker 3: balls in the trees start to move, So maybe they

905
00:51:00,960 --> 00:51:04,680
Speaker 3: are not big spider egg sacks. Instead, they are releasing

906
00:51:05,040 --> 00:51:09,799
Speaker 3: puffs of gas containing pink particles, like they're big bladders

907
00:51:09,840 --> 00:51:14,319
Speaker 3: of pink dust just fumigating the earth. So now you wonder, oh,

908
00:51:14,360 --> 00:51:16,560
Speaker 3: could this be why the rider and the horse birds

909
00:51:16,600 --> 00:51:19,799
Speaker 3: are all wearing gas masks. Then when they reach the

910
00:51:19,880 --> 00:51:22,760
Speaker 3: area of the windmill, beyond the dead cops of trees,

911
00:51:23,239 --> 00:51:26,080
Speaker 3: we see the ruins of a town with walls and

912
00:51:26,200 --> 00:51:29,880
Speaker 3: gates and towers and huts, all covered in the diseased

913
00:51:29,880 --> 00:51:32,960
Speaker 3: cotton balls and the fuzzy fern shoots. It's like a

914
00:51:33,000 --> 00:51:37,360
Speaker 3: city annihilated by a moldy, furry cancer that rides on

915
00:51:37,400 --> 00:51:40,320
Speaker 3: the wind. And all of this, by the way, happens

916
00:51:40,320 --> 00:51:42,520
Speaker 3: in the span of a few seconds, So up to

917
00:51:42,560 --> 00:51:45,240
Speaker 3: this point we're like less than a minute into the film.

918
00:51:45,239 --> 00:51:47,759
Speaker 3: But I really wanted to drill into this sequence of

919
00:51:47,800 --> 00:51:51,839
Speaker 3: shots because I love the way that each image and

920
00:51:51,880 --> 00:51:56,360
Speaker 3: each reverse shot shows you something strange and imaginative that

921
00:51:56,880 --> 00:52:01,680
Speaker 3: makes you reinterpret whatever you just assumed about the image

922
00:52:01,680 --> 00:52:05,120
Speaker 3: you saw a few seconds before. So it's almost like

923
00:52:05,560 --> 00:52:07,759
Speaker 3: sort of like getting you into the right frame of

924
00:52:07,800 --> 00:52:11,239
Speaker 3: mind to appreciate the film. It is priming you to

925
00:52:11,360 --> 00:52:13,799
Speaker 3: like let your mind come out of hiding and willingly

926
00:52:13,880 --> 00:52:15,719
Speaker 3: explore the light of an alien sun.

927
00:52:16,400 --> 00:52:18,560
Speaker 2: I think it's my understanding that all of this was

928
00:52:18,600 --> 00:52:21,399
Speaker 2: cut from Warriors of the Wind. They're just like cut

929
00:52:21,440 --> 00:52:24,680
Speaker 2: that crap let's get to it.

930
00:52:24,800 --> 00:52:28,680
Speaker 3: Obnoxious, But anyway, I would say this is illustrative of

931
00:52:28,680 --> 00:52:31,600
Speaker 3: something I would say about the movie generally, and generally

932
00:52:31,640 --> 00:52:35,879
Speaker 3: about my experience of Miyazaki, which is that NAUSICAA and

933
00:52:36,040 --> 00:52:41,200
Speaker 3: the rest of his movies are mostly very free of

934
00:52:41,719 --> 00:52:46,200
Speaker 3: perfunctory cinema, of perfunctory screen time. You know, a lot

935
00:52:46,280 --> 00:52:50,160
Speaker 3: of movies are filled up with shots that I feel

936
00:52:50,160 --> 00:52:55,040
Speaker 3: like there's something that the director thought had to be shown, Like, Okay,

937
00:52:55,080 --> 00:52:57,680
Speaker 3: he's going up to the big scene on the roof

938
00:52:57,719 --> 00:52:59,799
Speaker 3: of the building, so you have to show him going

939
00:52:59,840 --> 00:53:02,440
Speaker 3: to the elevator and getting in the elevator and pressing

940
00:53:02,440 --> 00:53:04,960
Speaker 3: the button for the top floor. So you get a

941
00:53:04,960 --> 00:53:09,080
Speaker 3: sequence of shots that are maybe necessary to move the

942
00:53:09,239 --> 00:53:13,920
Speaker 3: action along and help people understand what's about to happen.

943
00:53:14,320 --> 00:53:17,400
Speaker 3: But there's nothing dramatic about the shots themselves. They're just

944
00:53:17,480 --> 00:53:21,040
Speaker 3: mechanically sort of like giving you information to orient you

945
00:53:21,120 --> 00:53:24,160
Speaker 3: for the next thing. Miyazaki movies, in my opinion, have

946
00:53:24,520 --> 00:53:28,080
Speaker 3: very little of this. Instead, they seem to treat nearly

947
00:53:28,160 --> 00:53:33,239
Speaker 3: every frame as an opportunity. Everything you see is a

948
00:53:33,280 --> 00:53:36,520
Speaker 3: new chance to delight you or show you something interesting,

949
00:53:37,320 --> 00:53:40,040
Speaker 3: make you feel something, make you feel like you can

950
00:53:40,160 --> 00:53:43,880
Speaker 3: inhabit the film's world. And there's almost nothing I can

951
00:53:43,920 --> 00:53:47,080
Speaker 3: think of in this movie that is merely mechanical, serving

952
00:53:47,200 --> 00:53:50,480
Speaker 3: solely to orient the viewer in time and space, you know,

953
00:53:50,840 --> 00:53:52,799
Speaker 3: connect to one moment to the next, or set up

954
00:53:52,800 --> 00:53:58,160
Speaker 3: future scenes. Pretty Much every moment is pleasurable, or reveal

955
00:53:58,320 --> 00:54:01,839
Speaker 3: something interesting and strange, or is meaningful in itself.

956
00:54:02,160 --> 00:54:05,120
Speaker 2: Yeah, I agree. When Miyazaki shows you something, it's important

957
00:54:05,120 --> 00:54:08,720
Speaker 2: on some level, even if in say and saything like Todoro,

958
00:54:08,960 --> 00:54:10,600
Speaker 2: it just means you're going to stop and look at

959
00:54:10,600 --> 00:54:14,120
Speaker 2: a frog for several seconds and you know that that

960
00:54:14,160 --> 00:54:18,560
Speaker 2: frog is going to be exceptionally realized. So yeah, it's

961
00:54:18,600 --> 00:54:20,640
Speaker 2: it's it's important when he shows you something and you

962
00:54:20,680 --> 00:54:22,080
Speaker 2: have to you have to watch and take.

963
00:54:21,960 --> 00:54:25,960
Speaker 3: It in anyway. So the writer dismounts from the bird.

964
00:54:26,000 --> 00:54:28,359
Speaker 3: In the scene, he takes out a rifle. He goes

965
00:54:28,360 --> 00:54:31,080
Speaker 3: into one of the houses, and inside the house he

966
00:54:31,120 --> 00:54:35,120
Speaker 3: sees like skulls and signs of a formerly happy life

967
00:54:35,200 --> 00:54:37,920
Speaker 3: covered in oldest deadly silk, and on the floor there

968
00:54:37,960 --> 00:54:40,600
Speaker 3: is a child's doll. He reaches down to pick it

969
00:54:40,680 --> 00:54:43,040
Speaker 3: up and it crumbles to dust in his grip and

970
00:54:43,080 --> 00:54:45,600
Speaker 3: he says to himself. Yet another village is dead.

971
00:54:46,200 --> 00:54:48,320
Speaker 2: So this is will come to learn as the shape

972
00:54:48,360 --> 00:54:51,759
Speaker 2: of the world at the close of the Ceramic era,

973
00:54:52,000 --> 00:54:56,279
Speaker 2: some thousand years after a cataclysmic time known as the

974
00:54:56,320 --> 00:54:59,040
Speaker 2: Seven Days of Fire. So much of the world is hostile,

975
00:54:59,680 --> 00:55:04,200
Speaker 2: it's poisoned, it's dangerous for human beings and other organisms

976
00:55:04,200 --> 00:55:06,640
Speaker 2: from our time period, or like the birds, I guess,

977
00:55:06,640 --> 00:55:09,160
Speaker 2: things that have evolved more directly out of our time period.

978
00:55:09,719 --> 00:55:12,520
Speaker 2: Far flung human kingdoms are feuding over the remnants of

979
00:55:12,719 --> 00:55:17,120
Speaker 2: the earth, amid the constant threats of starvation, sickness, and

980
00:55:17,160 --> 00:55:20,680
Speaker 2: the insects of the toxic jungle or the Sea of decay.

981
00:55:21,440 --> 00:55:23,759
Speaker 3: Yes, though we won't find all of that out all

982
00:55:23,800 --> 00:55:27,320
Speaker 3: at once. Again, something that's very pleasing about the movie

983
00:55:27,400 --> 00:55:30,839
Speaker 3: is sort of the pace at which the information about

984
00:55:30,880 --> 00:55:32,560
Speaker 3: the broader world is revealed.

985
00:55:33,280 --> 00:55:37,560
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's teased out. There's some great stuff even in

986
00:55:37,560 --> 00:55:40,560
Speaker 2: the opening credits, which we'll get too, that give you

987
00:55:40,560 --> 00:55:42,839
Speaker 2: stuff to go on to figuring out where what has

988
00:55:42,880 --> 00:55:44,839
Speaker 2: happened to the world and what might happen again.

989
00:55:45,239 --> 00:55:47,360
Speaker 3: But so after this figure picks up the doll and

990
00:55:47,400 --> 00:55:49,880
Speaker 3: it crumbles, then suddenly we cut to the sky where

991
00:55:49,920 --> 00:55:54,680
Speaker 3: creatures are swarming. And these creatures are sort of hard

992
00:55:54,680 --> 00:55:57,480
Speaker 3: to describe. They're referred to as insects by the characters.

993
00:55:57,760 --> 00:56:02,160
Speaker 3: They're kind of like giant teal hawkroaches with dragonfly wings

994
00:56:02,239 --> 00:56:05,719
Speaker 3: and the heads of not dragonflies but dragons. They've got

995
00:56:05,760 --> 00:56:09,080
Speaker 3: like jaws and teeth and red eyes without lids, and

996
00:56:09,160 --> 00:56:14,400
Speaker 3: pink tongues lashing, and they make bizarre yammering noises that

997
00:56:14,840 --> 00:56:19,120
Speaker 3: sound halfway between like a locust swarm and something electronic

998
00:56:19,239 --> 00:56:22,200
Speaker 3: like a you know, a speaker glitching with RF interference.

999
00:56:23,719 --> 00:56:25,640
Speaker 3: So the rider sees this, he goes back to his

1000
00:56:25,680 --> 00:56:28,480
Speaker 3: horse birds and he says, let's go. Soon this place

1001
00:56:28,520 --> 00:56:31,480
Speaker 3: too will be consumed by the toxic jungle, and the

1002
00:56:31,520 --> 00:56:34,360
Speaker 3: giant birds sprint off into the desert with the sand

1003
00:56:34,440 --> 00:56:37,480
Speaker 3: crunching under their feet. And then finally, there was no

1004
00:56:37,600 --> 00:56:39,880
Speaker 3: music in the opening, but finally we get music in

1005
00:56:39,920 --> 00:56:43,120
Speaker 3: the opening narration that tells us a thousand years have

1006
00:56:43,239 --> 00:56:47,520
Speaker 3: passed since the collapse of industrialized civilization, a toxic jungle

1007
00:56:47,600 --> 00:56:50,400
Speaker 3: now spreads, threatening the survival of the last of the

1008
00:56:50,480 --> 00:56:53,560
Speaker 3: human race. And yeah, during the credits, as you said,

1009
00:56:53,560 --> 00:56:59,560
Speaker 3: we get images that are not explicit but they give

1010
00:56:59,600 --> 00:57:02,440
Speaker 3: us kind of hints of what happened before, Like there

1011
00:57:02,440 --> 00:57:06,480
Speaker 3: are these interesting tile mosaics that show things like boats

1012
00:57:06,600 --> 00:57:10,560
Speaker 3: but flying in the sky, and then giant, monstrous figures

1013
00:57:10,640 --> 00:57:13,279
Speaker 3: breathing fire onto the cities of humankind.

1014
00:57:13,800 --> 00:57:16,360
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's the kind of thing where I mean the first,

1015
00:57:16,400 --> 00:57:18,240
Speaker 2: probably first couple of times I watched this film, I

1016
00:57:18,280 --> 00:57:20,960
Speaker 2: didn't really pay as much attention to these credits, but

1017
00:57:21,040 --> 00:57:23,160
Speaker 2: they do reveal a lot.

1018
00:57:23,040 --> 00:57:25,320
Speaker 3: And I thought it'd be interesting to comment on the

1019
00:57:25,360 --> 00:57:28,560
Speaker 3: appearance of the giant warriors that are shown in the

1020
00:57:28,600 --> 00:57:31,760
Speaker 3: credit sequence, and then we'll figure into the movie later on.

1021
00:57:32,960 --> 00:57:35,280
Speaker 3: So this part seems to be showing how the old

1022
00:57:35,360 --> 00:57:41,280
Speaker 3: world perished in flames before the millennium, and obviously these

1023
00:57:41,320 --> 00:57:44,400
Speaker 3: giant humanoid figures had something to do with that. So

1024
00:57:44,560 --> 00:57:49,000
Speaker 3: they are shown standing over burning cities, red and black,

1025
00:57:49,200 --> 00:57:52,360
Speaker 3: lit from below by the fires that are consuming the

1026
00:57:52,440 --> 00:57:55,080
Speaker 3: human world, and the way they're lit by the fires

1027
00:57:55,080 --> 00:57:59,800
Speaker 3: from below, their legs and crotches are like red going pink,

1028
00:58:00,160 --> 00:58:03,280
Speaker 3: while their shoulders and heads are covered in black shadow

1029
00:58:03,520 --> 00:58:07,240
Speaker 3: except for solid white eyes near the tops of their heads,

1030
00:58:07,320 --> 00:58:10,720
Speaker 3: and then their heads are strangely bullet shape, making them

1031
00:58:10,720 --> 00:58:13,919
Speaker 3: look like mechanical men, kind of ghostly mechanical men.

1032
00:58:14,520 --> 00:58:17,240
Speaker 2: Yeah, they're very streamlined. We don't have any like surface

1033
00:58:17,280 --> 00:58:21,040
Speaker 2: details regarding their bodies. You know, they mostly in profile,

1034
00:58:21,120 --> 00:58:23,000
Speaker 2: so you get more of a sense of giant robot,

1035
00:58:23,040 --> 00:58:28,120
Speaker 2: of something mechanical, something coldly mechanical. And yeah, this will

1036
00:58:28,160 --> 00:58:31,240
Speaker 2: be important for later on. And again, I just love

1037
00:58:31,280 --> 00:58:35,600
Speaker 2: the ancestral art we see depicting these events. It's really great.

1038
00:58:36,120 --> 00:58:38,360
Speaker 3: And to further dwell on, you know, things we only

1039
00:58:38,360 --> 00:58:40,200
Speaker 3: see for a few seconds in the film, but there's

1040
00:58:40,240 --> 00:58:44,200
Speaker 3: full of interesting choices, Like even though the faces of

1041
00:58:44,240 --> 00:58:48,040
Speaker 3: these beings are hidden in shadow, they have a what

1042
00:58:48,120 --> 00:58:52,439
Speaker 3: I would say is a frighteningly unemotional posture. They look

1043
00:58:52,680 --> 00:58:56,560
Speaker 3: disturbingly free of malice, and I think they would look

1044
00:58:56,680 --> 00:58:59,960
Speaker 3: less scary if they looked angry or hateful.

1045
00:59:01,160 --> 00:59:03,960
Speaker 2: Yeah, there's like there's a cold sense of awful judgment

1046
00:59:04,040 --> 00:59:06,560
Speaker 2: to them, like they are machines, Like they are giant

1047
00:59:06,680 --> 00:59:10,480
Speaker 2: robots that have you know, there's been some sort of

1048
00:59:10,520 --> 00:59:12,720
Speaker 2: air and they've decided, Oh, all the cities of the

1049
00:59:12,720 --> 00:59:14,840
Speaker 2: world are supposed to be on fire, so that's what

1050
00:59:14,880 --> 00:59:15,440
Speaker 2: we're gonna do.

1051
00:59:16,320 --> 00:59:19,240
Speaker 3: Though, as the historical imagery of the credits fades away,

1052
00:59:19,440 --> 00:59:22,040
Speaker 3: we move up to the clouds, where we will spend

1053
00:59:22,080 --> 00:59:23,880
Speaker 3: a lot of the movie actually, and this is where

1054
00:59:23,880 --> 00:59:26,160
Speaker 3: we're going to meet our protagonists, to sort of where

1055
00:59:26,200 --> 00:59:29,800
Speaker 3: she's at home. In the clouds, we see an outline

1056
00:59:29,840 --> 00:59:32,720
Speaker 3: of a pair of giant wings drifting over the cloud tops,

1057
00:59:32,720 --> 00:59:35,000
Speaker 3: and at first you might think it's a bird, but

1058
00:59:35,040 --> 00:59:37,560
Speaker 3: then we see up close and again with the theme

1059
00:59:37,600 --> 00:59:41,000
Speaker 3: of like showing you something and then making you reinterpret

1060
00:59:41,040 --> 00:59:44,360
Speaker 3: what you just saw, the bird shaped thing is a human,

1061
00:59:44,720 --> 00:59:48,280
Speaker 3: a young woman riding on top of a wing shaped

1062
00:59:48,400 --> 00:59:51,760
Speaker 3: glider craft. It's kind of like a powered surfboard for

1063
00:59:51,800 --> 00:59:56,840
Speaker 3: the sky, and she looks over what remains of mountains

1064
00:59:56,880 --> 00:59:59,120
Speaker 3: that are kind of in the shape of monster skulls,

1065
00:59:59,560 --> 01:00:02,320
Speaker 3: and then she lands outside of a thick forest of

1066
01:00:02,480 --> 01:00:06,600
Speaker 3: monstrously oversized plants. Now, I think this might be a

1067
01:00:06,600 --> 01:00:10,640
Speaker 3: good moment to talk about the significance of the glider

1068
01:00:10,920 --> 01:00:14,920
Speaker 3: in the film. I struggle to think of another movie

1069
01:00:15,160 --> 01:00:19,480
Speaker 3: where a vehicle becomes such an emotional part of the story.

1070
01:00:19,520 --> 01:00:22,280
Speaker 3: I mean, you could say, maybe like The Millennium Falcon

1071
01:00:22,440 --> 01:00:25,600
Speaker 3: or something, but even that maybe takes multiple movies to

1072
01:00:25,680 --> 01:00:30,720
Speaker 3: achieve this kind of significance. The glider that Nausca flies

1073
01:00:30,760 --> 01:00:34,160
Speaker 3: around with is such a special and powerful element of

1074
01:00:34,200 --> 01:00:37,320
Speaker 3: the story, such that when there's a part later where

1075
01:00:37,360 --> 01:00:39,560
Speaker 3: it seems like the glider is in danger of being

1076
01:00:39,640 --> 01:00:43,280
Speaker 3: lost or destroyed, it's as if a beloved character we're

1077
01:00:43,320 --> 01:00:44,520
Speaker 3: having their life threatened.

1078
01:00:45,200 --> 01:00:50,120
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, absolutely, it is. All of the devices in

1079
01:00:50,160 --> 01:00:55,160
Speaker 2: this film, all of the vehicles, are really well thought out.

1080
01:00:55,200 --> 01:00:58,160
Speaker 2: They feel entirely real. You feel like every there are

1081
01:00:58,160 --> 01:01:00,880
Speaker 2: no mysteries to it, there's no like undefined portion of

1082
01:01:00,920 --> 01:01:03,600
Speaker 2: the thing. You know that there is an interior to

1083
01:01:03,640 --> 01:01:07,760
Speaker 2: the tanks, you know that there are seat belts on

1084
01:01:07,840 --> 01:01:10,040
Speaker 2: the seats inside of those airplanes, and you have the

1085
01:01:10,040 --> 01:01:13,680
Speaker 2: glider has this just intense physical reality to it as well.

1086
01:01:14,160 --> 01:01:17,440
Speaker 2: And the way that she interacts with it, the different

1087
01:01:17,440 --> 01:01:20,720
Speaker 2: poses she goes into whilst using it, it's it's all amazing.

1088
01:01:21,160 --> 01:01:23,880
Speaker 3: I mean, in a way to make a somewhat vulgar analogy,

1089
01:01:23,920 --> 01:01:26,760
Speaker 3: it's almost like Tony Stark's Iron Man suit. It is

1090
01:01:26,880 --> 01:01:31,800
Speaker 3: the device that she uses to like sort of upgrade

1091
01:01:31,840 --> 01:01:35,560
Speaker 3: herself from just a character into a superhero in a way,

1092
01:01:35,760 --> 01:01:38,520
Speaker 3: like it's the it's what she uses in a lot

1093
01:01:38,520 --> 01:01:41,240
Speaker 3: of the most crucial action scenes in the film.

1094
01:01:41,480 --> 01:01:45,840
Speaker 2: Yeah, except it has more physical reality because in those films,

1095
01:01:45,840 --> 01:01:48,560
Speaker 2: those Iron Man films, especially later on, it's like it's

1096
01:01:48,840 --> 01:01:51,480
Speaker 2: it's like, at times it's a it's pieces of a

1097
01:01:51,520 --> 01:01:54,600
Speaker 2: suit that are applied by CGI robot arms, and then

1098
01:01:54,680 --> 01:01:57,840
Speaker 2: later it's like nanites that crawl on to Tony Stark

1099
01:01:57,880 --> 01:02:00,720
Speaker 2: and become a suit, and it's like, I'm so far

1100
01:02:00,800 --> 01:02:03,960
Speaker 2: removed from what that is, Like show me the shoes.

1101
01:02:04,080 --> 01:02:08,000
Speaker 2: The suit isn't real, you know, whereas the glider always

1102
01:02:08,040 --> 01:02:08,640
Speaker 2: feels real.

1103
01:02:08,840 --> 01:02:10,320
Speaker 3: I already regret the comparison.

1104
01:02:10,360 --> 01:02:13,680
Speaker 2: I just I think I think the comparison is apt

1105
01:02:13,880 --> 01:02:17,240
Speaker 2: and the similarities are apt, but the difference also helps

1106
01:02:17,240 --> 01:02:20,240
Speaker 2: define what makes the glider work so well, you know.

1107
01:02:20,560 --> 01:02:24,440
Speaker 3: Yes, yes, So we follow Nausica as she explores the

1108
01:02:24,440 --> 01:02:27,840
Speaker 3: toxic jungle. She's wearing a gas mask. It also has

1109
01:02:27,920 --> 01:02:30,960
Speaker 3: the basset hound ears hanging off of the snout. She

1110
01:02:31,080 --> 01:02:34,480
Speaker 3: hops over giant lotus pods and ducks under tree roots

1111
01:02:34,520 --> 01:02:37,960
Speaker 3: and takes samples of the white fuzz we saw from earlier,

1112
01:02:38,000 --> 01:02:40,840
Speaker 3: the cancer that seems to have killed the villages, But

1113
01:02:40,920 --> 01:02:43,720
Speaker 3: she doesn't really seem afraid. In fact, there are like

1114
01:02:44,000 --> 01:02:47,240
Speaker 3: hulking insects like heaving around in the in the brush

1115
01:02:47,280 --> 01:02:50,440
Speaker 3: behind her, and she doesn't really seem afraid of them either.

1116
01:02:50,640 --> 01:02:55,240
Speaker 3: She's just sort of exploring. And eventually she comes across

1117
01:02:55,280 --> 01:03:00,640
Speaker 3: the figure of an enormous arthropod that she calls an oom.

1118
01:03:00,960 --> 01:03:04,400
Speaker 3: But it's not the creature itself, it's the shell of

1119
01:03:04,440 --> 01:03:06,960
Speaker 3: an ome. The ome has molted like a you know,

1120
01:03:07,000 --> 01:03:11,320
Speaker 3: like a locust, and left behind its shell, and she

1121
01:03:11,880 --> 01:03:14,400
Speaker 3: like starts to climb over it. Well, maybe we should

1122
01:03:14,400 --> 01:03:16,640
Speaker 3: take a moment to describe the omes because they're very

1123
01:03:16,680 --> 01:03:17,680
Speaker 3: important to the plot.

1124
01:03:18,080 --> 01:03:21,960
Speaker 2: Yeah, the omes are a wonderful mashup of several evocative,

1125
01:03:22,040 --> 01:03:25,880
Speaker 2: fantastic and natural world creatures. I think there's there's a

1126
01:03:25,960 --> 01:03:29,280
Speaker 2: clear sense of the cicada and the cicada shell to

1127
01:03:29,440 --> 01:03:32,840
Speaker 2: these creatures. That reminds me, especially of as a child

1128
01:03:33,280 --> 01:03:37,760
Speaker 2: finding a discarded cicada shell and playing with it or

1129
01:03:37,880 --> 01:03:40,040
Speaker 2: just staring at it. And I mean sometimes as an adult,

1130
01:03:40,080 --> 01:03:42,200
Speaker 2: I'll do this, you know, to find a cicada shell

1131
01:03:42,880 --> 01:03:45,600
Speaker 2: is kind of magical because it is like this this

1132
01:03:45,680 --> 01:03:50,240
Speaker 2: thing that is the complete exterior of the original larval creature,

1133
01:03:50,720 --> 01:03:53,000
Speaker 2: you know, and you see the full legs you see

1134
01:03:53,040 --> 01:03:56,000
Speaker 2: the eyes and so forth, and you get a strong

1135
01:03:56,080 --> 01:03:58,400
Speaker 2: sense of that with the ome. But there are other

1136
01:03:58,440 --> 01:04:01,000
Speaker 2: elements here as well. In one particular's scene, I feel

1137
01:04:01,000 --> 01:04:04,560
Speaker 2: like there's a strong sense of gray whales inspecting a boat.

1138
01:04:04,680 --> 01:04:06,439
Speaker 2: There's a scene where they come up through the water

1139
01:04:06,520 --> 01:04:09,520
Speaker 2: and they're floating around the boat, very much like whales

1140
01:04:09,520 --> 01:04:13,520
Speaker 2: in a breeding lagoon. Naturally, there's an element of the

1141
01:04:13,560 --> 01:04:17,640
Speaker 2: sandworms to them. Dune clearly was one of Miyazaki's many

1142
01:04:17,680 --> 01:04:23,760
Speaker 2: influences here. They're very interesting physically. They have segmented armor

1143
01:04:23,800 --> 01:04:29,280
Speaker 2: plating that animates really really well, and really interestingly, many legs,

1144
01:04:29,360 --> 01:04:32,920
Speaker 2: multiple eyes, and rows their frontmost legs have a feel

1145
01:04:32,960 --> 01:04:37,480
Speaker 2: of grasping fingers, but they can also emit glowing golden

1146
01:04:37,560 --> 01:04:41,040
Speaker 2: feelers that are very important to the plot. Also, their

1147
01:04:41,080 --> 01:04:45,120
Speaker 2: eyes normally glow blue when active, but they glow red

1148
01:04:45,160 --> 01:04:46,280
Speaker 2: when they're enraged.

1149
01:04:46,680 --> 01:04:49,400
Speaker 3: And the rage is a really interesting element because clearly

1150
01:04:49,440 --> 01:04:52,760
Speaker 3: these are by some characters viewed as monsters. They're certainly

1151
01:04:52,880 --> 01:04:57,840
Speaker 3: large insects, but they are also unambiguously presented as creatures

1152
01:04:57,840 --> 01:05:01,840
Speaker 3: that can feel. They have emotional lives of a sort,

1153
01:05:01,880 --> 01:05:03,800
Speaker 3: and there are things that upset them.

1154
01:05:04,240 --> 01:05:06,840
Speaker 2: Yeah, so that's another way they have a strong whil

1155
01:05:07,360 --> 01:05:09,840
Speaker 2: feeling to them, because there's the sense that there is

1156
01:05:09,880 --> 01:05:14,440
Speaker 2: intelligence there, there is emotion there, but it doesn't directly

1157
01:05:14,560 --> 01:05:17,600
Speaker 2: communicate to humans, you know, but we are able to

1158
01:05:18,640 --> 01:05:19,680
Speaker 2: sympathize with them.

1159
01:05:20,080 --> 01:05:24,000
Speaker 3: So Nausica climbs over this molted shell, and she even

1160
01:05:24,080 --> 01:05:27,080
Speaker 3: in a detail that I just it's hard to describe

1161
01:05:27,120 --> 01:05:29,880
Speaker 3: why this was so pleasing, but like what she does

1162
01:05:29,920 --> 01:05:33,160
Speaker 3: with it is she decides to harvest one of the

1163
01:05:33,600 --> 01:05:37,080
Speaker 3: discs covering one of its eyes. There's like a clear

1164
01:05:37,640 --> 01:05:41,840
Speaker 3: sort of shell material that she manages to blow out

1165
01:05:41,840 --> 01:05:43,560
Speaker 3: of the rest of the shell by using a bit

1166
01:05:43,600 --> 01:05:46,400
Speaker 3: of gunpowder and chips it out, and she's like, I

1167
01:05:46,440 --> 01:05:48,800
Speaker 3: want to take this ie back home with me. I

1168
01:05:48,880 --> 01:05:53,560
Speaker 3: just love that. And here, maybe we could do a

1169
01:05:53,600 --> 01:05:57,280
Speaker 3: note on Nausca's you know, the character of Nausica. So

1170
01:05:57,640 --> 01:06:00,560
Speaker 3: even in this opening scene alone in the talks jungle,

1171
01:06:01,360 --> 01:06:04,480
Speaker 3: we see a lot of her temperament and her personality.

1172
01:06:04,880 --> 01:06:08,280
Speaker 3: She has a very strong affinity for the natural world,

1173
01:06:08,440 --> 01:06:14,880
Speaker 3: even the toxic parts, and displays a broad scientific curiosity.

1174
01:06:15,360 --> 01:06:18,520
Speaker 3: And there's that's that's not just an intellectual thing, there's

1175
01:06:18,560 --> 01:06:22,040
Speaker 3: like an emotional manifestation of that, which is a kind

1176
01:06:22,080 --> 01:06:26,200
Speaker 3: of resting, happy sense of surprise about things. And she

1177
01:06:26,280 --> 01:06:29,640
Speaker 3: also shows a very fundamental kindness of spirit which comes

1178
01:06:29,680 --> 01:06:32,760
Speaker 3: through when she's like exploring this ohm shells. She's clearly

1179
01:06:33,240 --> 01:06:36,280
Speaker 3: delighted and interested by it. But then when she starts

1180
01:06:36,280 --> 01:06:38,400
Speaker 3: looking at it, she's like, oh, if I could you know,

1181
01:06:38,520 --> 01:06:41,320
Speaker 3: blow off one of these discs of the shell that

1182
01:06:41,400 --> 01:06:44,120
Speaker 3: covered the eye. This could be useful to people back

1183
01:06:44,120 --> 01:06:45,280
Speaker 3: home for making tools.

1184
01:06:45,800 --> 01:06:49,880
Speaker 2: Yeah, Nausicaa is one of the amid all these fantastic elements,

1185
01:06:49,920 --> 01:06:52,560
Speaker 2: and it's easy to focus on the weirdness like Nausicaa

1186
01:06:52,640 --> 01:06:57,160
Speaker 2: herself is such a strong component of the movie. I

1187
01:06:57,200 --> 01:06:59,080
Speaker 2: was talking about this with my and my wife my

1188
01:06:59,160 --> 01:07:01,680
Speaker 2: son this morning. What were your favorite parts about Nausicaa.

1189
01:07:01,800 --> 01:07:04,280
Speaker 2: And of course my son loved the fox squirrel because

1190
01:07:04,280 --> 01:07:07,800
Speaker 2: it's cute. It's full of personality and believable animal energy.

1191
01:07:08,240 --> 01:07:11,520
Speaker 2: You know, so many great sort of catlike animations to

1192
01:07:11,640 --> 01:07:15,400
Speaker 2: that that character. I guess, I guess it's a character.

1193
01:07:16,520 --> 01:07:19,920
Speaker 2: But uh, but then but then Nausicaa, Yeah, just so

1194
01:07:20,320 --> 01:07:23,760
Speaker 2: clearly defined, so much depth. I mean, she's she's strong,

1195
01:07:23,840 --> 01:07:27,560
Speaker 2: she's brave, she's loyal, but highly compassionate like we've been

1196
01:07:27,600 --> 01:07:30,880
Speaker 2: talking about, and she has this kind of determined sense

1197
01:07:30,920 --> 01:07:34,640
Speaker 2: of optimism for for what people can do, for what

1198
01:07:34,680 --> 01:07:38,480
Speaker 2: we could accomplish. And yet it's not like blind optimism,

1199
01:07:38,640 --> 01:07:43,960
Speaker 2: like when like she's deeply hurt by our failings and

1200
01:07:44,000 --> 01:07:47,600
Speaker 2: by our persistence when it comes to you know, choosing

1201
01:07:47,800 --> 01:07:50,360
Speaker 2: at times the bloody path or the illogical path or

1202
01:07:50,360 --> 01:07:52,640
Speaker 2: the stubborn path, so she feels all of that. It's

1203
01:07:52,640 --> 01:07:56,280
Speaker 2: not like this this you know, eyes closed optimism about

1204
01:07:56,280 --> 01:07:59,280
Speaker 2: the world, like it's grounded in reality, but it's focusing

1205
01:07:59,360 --> 01:08:01,440
Speaker 2: on what we could do and what we can do.

1206
01:08:02,120 --> 01:08:05,400
Speaker 3: I love the character of Nausica, not only as we

1207
01:08:05,400 --> 01:08:08,040
Speaker 3: were talking about earlier that you know, there are her

1208
01:08:08,240 --> 01:08:11,960
Speaker 3: heroic elements, like you know, the when it's thrilling to

1209
01:08:12,280 --> 01:08:14,720
Speaker 3: watch her as she races to the rescue or something,

1210
01:08:15,040 --> 01:08:19,200
Speaker 3: but also, yeah, her character is so fundamentally good, but

1211
01:08:19,280 --> 01:08:22,120
Speaker 3: in a very real way, not in a way where

1212
01:08:22,160 --> 01:08:25,080
Speaker 3: she's just a lawful, good paladin. You know, she is

1213
01:08:25,160 --> 01:08:29,080
Speaker 3: just such a believably admirable human and embodies a lot

1214
01:08:29,120 --> 01:08:32,800
Speaker 3: of character traits that I literally just like getting excited

1215
01:08:33,000 --> 01:08:36,280
Speaker 3: about kids watching the movie and wanting to be like Nausica,

1216
01:08:36,280 --> 01:08:38,679
Speaker 3: because wanting to be like Nausica is a wonderful thing.

1217
01:08:39,160 --> 01:08:41,960
Speaker 2: Yes, absolutely, my son had a poster of Nasca up

1218
01:08:42,000 --> 01:08:44,160
Speaker 2: on his wall for a bit, because one if you

1219
01:08:44,200 --> 01:08:46,880
Speaker 2: get the manga series, there's a nice little full color

1220
01:08:47,200 --> 01:08:50,439
Speaker 2: Nasica poster of her underglyder that comes with it. I

1221
01:08:50,479 --> 01:08:52,080
Speaker 2: think it finally got torn out by accident.

1222
01:08:52,560 --> 01:08:55,439
Speaker 3: I was truly getting I don't want to get like

1223
01:08:55,439 --> 01:08:57,800
Speaker 3: this here. I was getting very emotional thinking about like

1224
01:08:57,880 --> 01:08:59,519
Speaker 3: when my daughter is going to be old enough to

1225
01:08:59,520 --> 01:09:01,599
Speaker 3: watch this movie, and you know, I don't know, maybe

1226
01:09:01,600 --> 01:09:03,759
Speaker 3: she won't even like it, who knows, but I feel

1227
01:09:03,760 --> 01:09:05,639
Speaker 3: like she probably will. And I was thinking about, oh,

1228
01:09:05,680 --> 01:09:08,960
Speaker 3: what imagining her like playing NAUSICAA wanting to fly around

1229
01:09:09,000 --> 01:09:11,880
Speaker 3: the house and stuff, and so I don't know, it

1230
01:09:12,600 --> 01:09:23,120
Speaker 3: is powerful, but anyway, sorry.

1231
01:09:23,200 --> 01:09:23,479
Speaker 2: Yeah.

1232
01:09:23,520 --> 01:09:28,559
Speaker 3: So in the story, so she's exploring this this shell

1233
01:09:28,600 --> 01:09:31,200
Speaker 3: and she she sits down on it, and there's a

1234
01:09:31,240 --> 01:09:33,400
Speaker 3: part where she's sort of like she gets covered in

1235
01:09:33,479 --> 01:09:36,160
Speaker 3: the you know, these dust particles that are coming off

1236
01:09:36,200 --> 01:09:38,960
Speaker 3: of these these toxic plants that they're calling the spores,

1237
01:09:39,000 --> 01:09:41,439
Speaker 3: And she says the Machigo poems are sending out their

1238
01:09:41,479 --> 01:09:44,880
Speaker 3: afternoon spores. It's hard to believe these spores could kill me.

1239
01:09:45,080 --> 01:09:47,880
Speaker 3: Five minutes without a mask and I'd be dead. So

1240
01:09:47,920 --> 01:09:51,559
Speaker 3: she's confirming that she recognizes that the jungle is deadly.

1241
01:09:51,760 --> 01:09:54,640
Speaker 3: It's not like she's in denial about the danger of it.

1242
01:09:55,200 --> 01:09:59,479
Speaker 3: But she also just has this detached appreciation for its

1243
01:09:59,520 --> 01:10:03,680
Speaker 3: beauty and its own purposes. But she's interrupted when she

1244
01:10:03,760 --> 01:10:06,679
Speaker 3: hears a commotion in the distance. There are gunshots. Somebody

1245
01:10:06,720 --> 01:10:09,240
Speaker 3: must be fighting the insects of the jungle or trying

1246
01:10:09,240 --> 01:10:11,759
Speaker 3: to escape them. So she comes out of the jungle.

1247
01:10:11,800 --> 01:10:13,800
Speaker 3: She like climbs up maybe on one of these big

1248
01:10:13,840 --> 01:10:18,439
Speaker 3: skull mountain statues, and she comes up to see that

1249
01:10:18,479 --> 01:10:21,120
Speaker 3: there is a huge ome, probably the same one that

1250
01:10:21,240 --> 01:10:23,360
Speaker 3: left behind the molting that she was just climbing on.

1251
01:10:23,720 --> 01:10:26,960
Speaker 3: It's chasing the man with the two horse birds from

1252
01:10:27,000 --> 01:10:30,200
Speaker 3: the prologue. It's bearing right down on him. So Nausica

1253
01:10:30,920 --> 01:10:33,920
Speaker 3: dashes to her glider. She flies off to the rescue,

1254
01:10:34,000 --> 01:10:36,240
Speaker 3: and in the end she manages to prevent it from

1255
01:10:36,320 --> 01:10:39,040
Speaker 3: killing him. She manages to stun the ome with flash

1256
01:10:39,120 --> 01:10:41,880
Speaker 3: bangs and then pleads with it to go back to

1257
01:10:41,920 --> 01:10:44,080
Speaker 3: the jungle. She like talks to it as she's flying

1258
01:10:44,080 --> 01:10:46,879
Speaker 3: alongside it on the glider, saying, this is not your world,

1259
01:10:47,520 --> 01:10:50,360
Speaker 3: and she succeeds. She looks back and the rider on

1260
01:10:50,360 --> 01:10:51,840
Speaker 3: the horse this will turn out to be the character

1261
01:10:51,960 --> 01:10:55,200
Speaker 3: Lord Yupa who they know each other. But he looks

1262
01:10:55,240 --> 01:10:59,240
Speaker 3: back and he marvels that she's able to turn away

1263
01:10:59,320 --> 01:11:01,960
Speaker 3: the rage of the huge beast with nothing but some

1264
01:11:02,000 --> 01:11:04,759
Speaker 3: flash grenades and an insect charm.

1265
01:11:04,880 --> 01:11:08,120
Speaker 2: He says, oh, yes, this is the cool little device

1266
01:11:08,240 --> 01:11:11,880
Speaker 2: that she twirls around in the wind and creates this

1267
01:11:12,120 --> 01:11:13,800
Speaker 2: soothing sound for the insects.

1268
01:11:14,240 --> 01:11:17,880
Speaker 3: Her relationship with the insects is so interesting because she

1269
01:11:18,040 --> 01:11:21,599
Speaker 3: recognizes that they are dangerous. She's not in denial about them,

1270
01:11:22,080 --> 01:11:24,760
Speaker 3: and many times in the movie she has to act

1271
01:11:24,960 --> 01:11:27,920
Speaker 3: forcefully to prevent them from hurting people, you know, throwing

1272
01:11:28,040 --> 01:11:31,200
Speaker 3: flash bangs to stunt it and trying to charm it

1273
01:11:31,240 --> 01:11:33,800
Speaker 3: and turn it away. But she also doesn't want to

1274
01:11:33,880 --> 01:11:37,479
Speaker 3: hurt the insects, and she speaks to them with a

1275
01:11:37,560 --> 01:11:41,200
Speaker 3: kind of strained affection, telling them to go back to

1276
01:11:41,280 --> 01:11:45,280
Speaker 3: their jungle, telling them firmly but compassionately that they have

1277
01:11:45,360 --> 01:11:48,679
Speaker 3: to calm down. And there's something she says multiple times

1278
01:11:48,680 --> 01:11:50,719
Speaker 3: in the movie to an insect or to an ome.

1279
01:11:51,320 --> 01:11:53,880
Speaker 3: That really stuck with me. I thought this was so interesting.

1280
01:11:54,439 --> 01:11:58,520
Speaker 3: The phrase she says is please be good, which connotes

1281
01:11:58,600 --> 01:12:03,559
Speaker 3: this sense of familiarity and responsibility of one for the

1282
01:12:03,560 --> 01:12:06,479
Speaker 3: behavior of the other, like a parent would say to

1283
01:12:06,520 --> 01:12:08,599
Speaker 3: their own child, please be good.

1284
01:12:09,400 --> 01:12:13,240
Speaker 2: Yeah, and you know, and this becomes important too at

1285
01:12:13,280 --> 01:12:16,000
Speaker 2: the backstory of nausica Things, we learn about her past.

1286
01:12:16,400 --> 01:12:19,439
Speaker 3: So after she saves him from the insect, the two

1287
01:12:19,520 --> 01:12:23,080
Speaker 3: characters meet Nausicaa. She is the Princess of the Valley

1288
01:12:23,080 --> 01:12:26,400
Speaker 3: of the Wind we will learn, which is a small, humble,

1289
01:12:26,520 --> 01:12:29,800
Speaker 3: peaceful kingdom in this post apocalyptic world. And the man

1290
01:12:29,840 --> 01:12:32,280
Speaker 3: who's been riding the bird again is Lord Yupa. He

1291
01:12:32,400 --> 01:12:34,680
Speaker 3: is a servant or some kind of night of the

1292
01:12:34,760 --> 01:12:38,799
Speaker 3: Valley of the Wind. And when they meet, Yupa reveals

1293
01:12:38,840 --> 01:12:41,200
Speaker 3: that he was chased by the om because he's shot

1294
01:12:41,320 --> 01:12:44,280
Speaker 3: at an insect. And this will be significant later because

1295
01:12:44,280 --> 01:12:47,439
Speaker 3: we learn that like any form of violence against one,

1296
01:12:47,520 --> 01:12:50,240
Speaker 3: tends to agitate and draw the rage of all the

1297
01:12:50,240 --> 01:12:51,280
Speaker 3: rest of the insects.

1298
01:12:52,000 --> 01:12:54,880
Speaker 2: Yeah, this ties in well to the pacivism themes throughout

1299
01:12:54,880 --> 01:12:57,519
Speaker 2: the film that yeah, violence doesn't actually solve anything, It

1300
01:12:57,640 --> 01:13:01,280
Speaker 2: just causes more problems. The way you saw things is

1301
01:13:01,360 --> 01:13:03,160
Speaker 2: ultimately through communication and empathy.

1302
01:13:03,439 --> 01:13:07,240
Speaker 3: I think violence is often shown to solve an immediate

1303
01:13:07,320 --> 01:13:12,840
Speaker 3: situation but create an even bigger problem in the near future. Yeah,

1304
01:13:13,040 --> 01:13:15,360
Speaker 3: but he says the reason he shot in an insect

1305
01:13:15,520 --> 01:13:18,600
Speaker 3: was lord Yupa is not shown as being cruel or

1306
01:13:18,600 --> 01:13:20,840
Speaker 3: malicious either. He says he had no choice to do

1307
01:13:20,920 --> 01:13:23,320
Speaker 3: it because he thought that the insect was attacking a

1308
01:13:23,400 --> 01:13:26,280
Speaker 3: human baby. But it wasn't a human baby. It turns

1309
01:13:26,280 --> 01:13:29,559
Speaker 3: out it was a pocket sized mammal called a fox squirrel,

1310
01:13:30,160 --> 01:13:32,439
Speaker 3: and lord Yupa still has the animal with him here,

1311
01:13:32,840 --> 01:13:36,240
Speaker 3: and Nausica quite quickly takes it on as her pet,

1312
01:13:36,680 --> 01:13:39,000
Speaker 3: despite its viciousness. They talk about it, they say, you

1313
01:13:39,000 --> 01:13:41,479
Speaker 3: know these things are You know they're mean? And when

1314
01:13:41,520 --> 01:13:44,759
Speaker 3: she first meets the fox squirrel, it bites her hand

1315
01:13:44,920 --> 01:13:48,200
Speaker 3: and draws blood. This is another running theme I loved.

1316
01:13:48,840 --> 01:13:53,320
Speaker 3: There are many scenes throughout the movie of Nausica tolerating

1317
01:13:53,479 --> 01:13:56,720
Speaker 3: and showing a sort of kindness or at least a

1318
01:13:56,920 --> 01:14:00,880
Speaker 3: lack of reaction to creatures and people that are threatening

1319
01:14:00,960 --> 01:14:06,080
Speaker 3: her and being unreasonable, and somehow by sort of deflecting

1320
01:14:06,120 --> 01:14:09,200
Speaker 3: and stepping back, she is often able to change the

1321
01:14:09,200 --> 01:14:12,880
Speaker 3: course of the action or change your relationship just by

1322
01:14:13,280 --> 01:14:17,839
Speaker 3: not reacting in kind to somebody who is being threatening

1323
01:14:18,400 --> 01:14:18,920
Speaker 3: or violent.

1324
01:14:19,280 --> 01:14:21,519
Speaker 2: Yeah, so much of this film is about this idea

1325
01:14:21,640 --> 01:14:24,960
Speaker 2: that our relationship with nature is out of balance, both

1326
01:14:25,080 --> 01:14:29,559
Speaker 2: here in our world but also within the fantastic world

1327
01:14:29,560 --> 01:14:31,760
Speaker 2: of the film, and that things need to be put

1328
01:14:31,800 --> 01:14:34,439
Speaker 2: back in balance. And so even with the fox squirrel

1329
01:14:34,840 --> 01:14:37,200
Speaker 2: that is largely there as just kind of a mascot

1330
01:14:37,280 --> 01:14:39,559
Speaker 2: and companion that spends a lot of time looking cute

1331
01:14:39,600 --> 01:14:42,200
Speaker 2: and being like the loyal cute creature on her shoulder

1332
01:14:42,240 --> 01:14:46,120
Speaker 2: and so forth. But yeah, in this initial meeting is angry.

1333
01:14:46,200 --> 01:14:49,640
Speaker 2: It bites her, draws blood, and I think that's important

1334
01:14:49,680 --> 01:14:54,040
Speaker 2: to the overarching themes of the film to see that

1335
01:14:54,120 --> 01:14:58,320
Speaker 2: this complex view of nature is evident even in the

1336
01:14:58,360 --> 01:14:59,519
Speaker 2: cute mascot character.

1337
01:15:00,439 --> 01:15:02,840
Speaker 3: So, Nausica and Lord Upa go back to the Valley

1338
01:15:02,840 --> 01:15:04,280
Speaker 3: of the Wind. They go back to their home, and

1339
01:15:04,280 --> 01:15:04,839
Speaker 3: they're welcomed.

1340
01:15:04,840 --> 01:15:05,439
Speaker 2: When they arrive.

1341
01:15:05,920 --> 01:15:09,599
Speaker 3: Nasca is reunited with her family, but things the action

1342
01:15:09,680 --> 01:15:12,880
Speaker 3: of the story begins to really kick into gear when

1343
01:15:13,600 --> 01:15:19,040
Speaker 3: the people of the valley are confronted by interventions from

1344
01:15:19,200 --> 01:15:21,559
Speaker 3: the other nations around them who are maybe not so

1345
01:15:21,680 --> 01:15:24,200
Speaker 3: humble and not so peaceful, but are in fact at

1346
01:15:24,240 --> 01:15:27,160
Speaker 3: war with each other, and the valley is caught in

1347
01:15:27,200 --> 01:15:29,519
Speaker 3: the middle. And here I think maybe we should stop

1348
01:15:29,560 --> 01:15:32,240
Speaker 3: going kind of like seen by scene and instead just

1349
01:15:32,280 --> 01:15:35,240
Speaker 3: like talk about some things that stick out from the

1350
01:15:35,320 --> 01:15:36,560
Speaker 3: narrative as it progresses.

1351
01:15:37,160 --> 01:15:41,360
Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah, there are so many things to potentially discussed

1352
01:15:41,400 --> 01:15:44,160
Speaker 2: in the film. One thing, you know, every time you

1353
01:15:44,240 --> 01:15:47,120
Speaker 2: rewatch a great film, something hits you a little bit differently.

1354
01:15:47,360 --> 01:15:51,240
Speaker 2: Either something with you has changed over the years, or

1355
01:15:51,280 --> 01:15:53,559
Speaker 2: you've learned something new or been exposed to something new.

1356
01:15:54,160 --> 01:15:58,200
Speaker 2: In my case, one of these was the starship that

1357
01:15:58,240 --> 01:16:02,120
Speaker 2: we're exposed to. We see this on the like ruined

1358
01:16:02,160 --> 01:16:06,720
Speaker 2: on the shores of the of the sea there, and

1359
01:16:06,920 --> 01:16:09,920
Speaker 2: it looks very much like a submarine. It looks like

1360
01:16:09,960 --> 01:16:14,599
Speaker 2: an old military submarine. But we're told, like, oh, you know,

1361
01:16:14,680 --> 01:16:18,240
Speaker 2: these things they used to also travel in the stars.

1362
01:16:18,439 --> 01:16:21,439
Speaker 2: They speak of it as a starship. And the way

1363
01:16:21,479 --> 01:16:23,759
Speaker 2: I used to interpret that and still kind of interpret

1364
01:16:23,760 --> 01:16:26,240
Speaker 2: it this way, is like, well, they're so far removed

1365
01:16:26,240 --> 01:16:29,080
Speaker 2: from the technology of the ancients, they don't really know

1366
01:16:29,120 --> 01:16:32,120
Speaker 2: what it was for. They think that a submarine may

1367
01:16:32,160 --> 01:16:35,880
Speaker 2: have also flown amid the stars, and I found that

1368
01:16:35,960 --> 01:16:39,360
Speaker 2: rather enthralling. But I think another strong theory is that

1369
01:16:39,400 --> 01:16:42,600
Speaker 2: this is a reference to the fantastic flying submarine in

1370
01:16:42,640 --> 01:16:46,320
Speaker 2: the nineteen sixty three Toho film Atragon, which we previously

1371
01:16:46,320 --> 01:16:49,200
Speaker 2: discussed on Weird House Cinema. It's like, of course, submarines

1372
01:16:49,200 --> 01:16:52,280
Speaker 2: can fly and can go into space. I didn't.

1373
01:16:52,360 --> 01:16:54,879
Speaker 3: I did not make that connection at all. That's amazing.

1374
01:16:55,400 --> 01:16:57,240
Speaker 2: Yeah, So I don't know. I still hold both of

1375
01:16:57,240 --> 01:17:00,320
Speaker 2: those interpretations in my head, but it's something that I

1376
01:17:00,360 --> 01:17:03,360
Speaker 2: guess would have probably been clear to, you know, to

1377
01:17:03,479 --> 01:17:06,439
Speaker 2: sci fi anime viewers of the day in the intended

1378
01:17:06,560 --> 01:17:08,280
Speaker 2: you know, original intended Japanese audience.

1379
01:17:08,800 --> 01:17:11,920
Speaker 3: What do you think about the super weapon theme. There

1380
01:17:11,920 --> 01:17:15,080
Speaker 3: are a lot of movies, especially like sci fi or

1381
01:17:15,120 --> 01:17:18,760
Speaker 3: fantasy movies, that have the plot device of a kind

1382
01:17:18,760 --> 01:17:22,040
Speaker 3: of super weapon that somebody has come into possession of

1383
01:17:22,240 --> 01:17:24,880
Speaker 3: that could annihilate the other side in a conflict, and

1384
01:17:24,920 --> 01:17:27,320
Speaker 3: maybe there's a struggle to possess the super weapon. That

1385
01:17:27,439 --> 01:17:30,040
Speaker 3: is a plot element here, but it's different than it

1386
01:17:30,080 --> 01:17:35,360
Speaker 3: often is. There is something instead kind of frightening but

1387
01:17:35,479 --> 01:17:40,760
Speaker 3: also sad and pathetic about the super weapon plot line

1388
01:17:40,800 --> 01:17:41,439
Speaker 3: in this film.

1389
01:17:42,200 --> 01:17:46,439
Speaker 2: Yeah, the concerning the Giant Warriors or the Giant God Warriors,

1390
01:17:46,439 --> 01:17:50,240
Speaker 2: I think is they're sometimes translated. Yeah, as we mentioned

1391
01:17:50,280 --> 01:17:52,559
Speaker 2: earlier in the film, we see those flashes of them

1392
01:17:52,720 --> 01:17:54,599
Speaker 2: during the Seven Days of Fire, and they look kind

1393
01:17:54,600 --> 01:17:59,479
Speaker 2: of like big robots, illuminated partially by the flames of

1394
01:17:59,479 --> 01:18:02,080
Speaker 2: burning sea, and they have these kind of like light staffs,

1395
01:18:02,760 --> 01:18:06,439
Speaker 2: and it's generally like kind of a clean, inorganic look

1396
01:18:07,760 --> 01:18:11,000
Speaker 2: that the creature the things have. But later in the film,

1397
01:18:11,040 --> 01:18:14,080
Speaker 2: is the plot progresses, a part of the plot concerns

1398
01:18:14,920 --> 01:18:18,080
Speaker 2: some remnant of these things that has been unearthed beneath

1399
01:18:18,080 --> 01:18:22,440
Speaker 2: the city of Pegie that has become a contested artifact,

1400
01:18:23,040 --> 01:18:27,760
Speaker 2: and we come to learn that these are not quite robots.

1401
01:18:27,920 --> 01:18:34,040
Speaker 2: They're at least biomechanical, if not entirely biological, and you know,

1402
01:18:34,080 --> 01:18:36,519
Speaker 2: there's a whole supply with them, like regrowing one of

1403
01:18:36,560 --> 01:18:38,519
Speaker 2: these things and trying to get it in a state

1404
01:18:38,560 --> 01:18:41,600
Speaker 2: where it can be used again, and there is a

1405
01:18:42,320 --> 01:18:45,240
Speaker 2: strong sense of the thing that should not be to them,

1406
01:18:46,000 --> 01:18:48,519
Speaker 2: a concept that certainly is used a lot in sci fi,

1407
01:18:48,640 --> 01:18:50,840
Speaker 2: horror and fantasy, but I think this is one of

1408
01:18:50,840 --> 01:18:53,760
Speaker 2: the most impactful examples of it as far as I'm

1409
01:18:53,800 --> 01:18:57,519
Speaker 2: concerned in my viewing, because when we start seeing this

1410
01:18:57,600 --> 01:19:02,640
Speaker 2: thing again growing in power, and then when it's finally unveiled,

1411
01:19:02,760 --> 01:19:06,839
Speaker 2: when it's finally sort of resurrected again, there's just a strong,

1412
01:19:07,040 --> 01:19:09,800
Speaker 2: overwhelming sense of like, this was a mistake. This was

1413
01:19:09,840 --> 01:19:11,639
Speaker 2: a mistake in the past, and you've made an even

1414
01:19:11,680 --> 01:19:17,360
Speaker 2: bigger mistake bringing it back. And it's like it's destructive. Yes,

1415
01:19:17,439 --> 01:19:20,320
Speaker 2: it has. There's strong allusions to atomic weaponry and the

1416
01:19:20,360 --> 01:19:22,200
Speaker 2: way it behaves and the way it sends out like

1417
01:19:22,240 --> 01:19:26,040
Speaker 2: this devastating death beam, but it's also like in a

1418
01:19:26,120 --> 01:19:31,160
Speaker 2: constant state of decay, you know, or or incomplete gestation.

1419
01:19:31,400 --> 01:19:35,680
Speaker 2: It's it's like malformed. It's like an unrealized dream that

1420
01:19:35,800 --> 01:19:39,840
Speaker 2: is more nightmare than anything else. And what makes it

1421
01:19:39,920 --> 01:19:42,639
Speaker 2: more horrifying is when you have characters in the film

1422
01:19:42,640 --> 01:19:45,879
Speaker 2: that then double down on their dedication to their plans

1423
01:19:45,960 --> 01:19:51,320
Speaker 2: involving this technology, despite how just revolting and flawed and

1424
01:19:51,439 --> 01:19:54,240
Speaker 2: ultimately ineffective it clearly is.

1425
01:19:54,240 --> 01:19:58,800
Speaker 3: Is the weapon itself sentient It kind of seems like it,

1426
01:19:58,880 --> 01:20:02,519
Speaker 3: and it seems like its existence is a nightmare that

1427
01:20:02,640 --> 01:20:05,200
Speaker 3: it would like to wake up from like it does

1428
01:20:05,240 --> 01:20:08,760
Speaker 3: not want to exist and it is not happy with

1429
01:20:08,800 --> 01:20:09,519
Speaker 3: what it is.

1430
01:20:10,640 --> 01:20:14,080
Speaker 2: Yeah, and it's again it's it's horrifying. It's a horrifying thing.

1431
01:20:15,720 --> 01:20:20,280
Speaker 2: Just excellent vision on Miyazaki's part. It's my understanding. I

1432
01:20:20,320 --> 01:20:21,880
Speaker 2: haven't read this far into the manga, but I think

1433
01:20:21,880 --> 01:20:24,080
Speaker 2: we learned more about them in the manga, but in

1434
01:20:24,120 --> 01:20:26,439
Speaker 2: the film at least, I feel like we also know

1435
01:20:27,320 --> 01:20:31,000
Speaker 2: just enough. You know, there's a lot of mystery to

1436
01:20:31,080 --> 01:20:34,920
Speaker 2: what they are and how they worked, why they were

1437
01:20:35,040 --> 01:20:39,640
Speaker 2: they were created, and yeah, absolutely a perfect thing that

1438
01:20:39,680 --> 01:20:40,240
Speaker 2: should not be.

1439
01:20:40,760 --> 01:20:43,880
Speaker 3: There's another thing I wanted to mention that Naska does

1440
01:20:44,560 --> 01:20:47,400
Speaker 3: better than most films that have this element, which it

1441
01:20:47,479 --> 01:20:52,840
Speaker 3: has a prophecy and fulfillment of prophecy element. This is

1442
01:20:52,880 --> 01:20:56,240
Speaker 3: something I often find kind of tedious in storytelling. I

1443
01:20:56,280 --> 01:20:59,080
Speaker 3: don't know. One thing I might compare it to is

1444
01:20:59,120 --> 01:21:02,040
Speaker 3: the solution of a of a mystery story, Like when

1445
01:21:02,080 --> 01:21:04,200
Speaker 3: there's a murder mystery and you don't know who did it,

1446
01:21:04,240 --> 01:21:06,559
Speaker 3: and you know that's very exciting to not know and

1447
01:21:06,680 --> 01:21:10,880
Speaker 3: want to find out. Almost always it's kind of disappointing

1448
01:21:10,920 --> 01:21:13,400
Speaker 3: when you actually do find out. It's the rare story

1449
01:21:13,439 --> 01:21:17,880
Speaker 3: where the solution of the murder mystery is as interesting

1450
01:21:17,960 --> 01:21:20,400
Speaker 3: and exciting as it felt to be in the middle

1451
01:21:20,400 --> 01:21:22,759
Speaker 3: of the mystery and not know. You know, I sometimes

1452
01:21:22,840 --> 01:21:24,960
Speaker 3: call out the few examples I can think of, like

1453
01:21:25,040 --> 01:21:26,760
Speaker 3: you know, a name of the Rose, where like the

1454
01:21:26,800 --> 01:21:30,800
Speaker 3: solution is fascinating and exciting. This is one of the

1455
01:21:30,800 --> 01:21:33,959
Speaker 3: few stories I can think of that has a truly

1456
01:21:34,360 --> 01:21:39,439
Speaker 3: thrillingly satisfying fulfillment of prophecy, which you know, often has

1457
01:21:39,479 --> 01:21:42,000
Speaker 3: the opposite effect on me when when a character fulfills

1458
01:21:42,000 --> 01:21:45,360
Speaker 3: a prophecy, I'm often just kind of like, okay, yeah, no,

1459
01:21:45,520 --> 01:21:49,400
Speaker 3: it was all foretold this then this movie, I don't

1460
01:21:49,439 --> 01:21:50,800
Speaker 3: know how you feel about a little but like the

1461
01:21:50,880 --> 01:21:55,280
Speaker 3: fulfillment is unexpected, like it causes you once again, like

1462
01:21:55,280 --> 01:21:57,719
Speaker 3: I said, about many things, and you know, even mundane

1463
01:21:57,720 --> 01:22:00,519
Speaker 3: little things. From shot to shot, the movie is often

1464
01:22:00,560 --> 01:22:04,880
Speaker 3: just making you understand something you saw before, or an

1465
01:22:04,880 --> 01:22:07,400
Speaker 3: image you saw before and thought you understood in a

1466
01:22:07,439 --> 01:22:10,920
Speaker 3: different way. The fulfillment of the prophecy element does the

1467
01:22:10,960 --> 01:22:11,680
Speaker 3: same thing in.

1468
01:22:11,680 --> 01:22:14,760
Speaker 2: This Yeah, I would agree with that. I would say

1469
01:22:14,760 --> 01:22:18,280
Speaker 2: another couple of examples that I think do the prophecy

1470
01:22:19,240 --> 01:22:21,800
Speaker 2: thing well would be the Never Ending Story and the

1471
01:22:21,880 --> 01:22:24,320
Speaker 2: Dark Crystal. I think I like the way they handle it,

1472
01:22:24,320 --> 01:22:26,000
Speaker 2: but they but they both handle it in a slightly

1473
01:22:26,000 --> 01:22:29,200
Speaker 2: different way, so maybe not directly comparable to the Nausica

1474
01:22:29,320 --> 01:22:32,200
Speaker 2: but but yeah, I agree that sometimes the whole who

1475
01:22:32,200 --> 01:22:35,639
Speaker 2: will be the chosen One then can be a little

1476
01:22:35,680 --> 01:22:37,840
Speaker 2: trite because you know, of course, we know who the

1477
01:22:37,920 --> 01:22:39,559
Speaker 2: chosen one is going to be in any given picture.

1478
01:22:39,680 --> 01:22:42,559
Speaker 2: Usually can see it coming a mile away, or they'll

1479
01:22:42,560 --> 01:22:44,720
Speaker 2: flip it. They'll give you a little twist, but you're

1480
01:22:44,720 --> 01:22:46,760
Speaker 2: only going to twist one or two degrees to the

1481
01:22:46,800 --> 01:22:47,360
Speaker 2: left of the right.

1482
01:22:47,479 --> 01:22:52,000
Speaker 3: Really, the fulfillment of the prophecy here is so weird

1483
01:22:52,360 --> 01:22:57,320
Speaker 3: and so unexpected and so beautiful when it happens. I'm

1484
01:22:57,360 --> 01:23:00,280
Speaker 3: getting goosebumps right now thinking about it.

1485
01:23:00,280 --> 01:23:03,160
Speaker 2: It is just a very goosebump bump inducing film, you know,

1486
01:23:03,280 --> 01:23:07,120
Speaker 2: it just hits all the right notes. Can you believe

1487
01:23:07,120 --> 01:23:09,160
Speaker 2: we missed being able to see this on the big

1488
01:23:09,200 --> 01:23:10,840
Speaker 2: screen by just like a week or two? I think

1489
01:23:11,360 --> 01:23:15,000
Speaker 2: earlier this month they put it back in theaters, But

1490
01:23:15,320 --> 01:23:17,920
Speaker 2: I think a lot of the A Miyazaki films are

1491
01:23:18,000 --> 01:23:20,920
Speaker 2: regularly put back in theaters, So I should have mentioned

1492
01:23:20,920 --> 01:23:23,160
Speaker 2: that when we were talking about ways to see it. Yeah,

1493
01:23:23,720 --> 01:23:27,160
Speaker 2: keep an eye out because periodically you can catch a

1494
01:23:27,200 --> 01:23:31,200
Speaker 2: Miyazaki film on the big screen in North America at least,

1495
01:23:31,200 --> 01:23:32,639
Speaker 2: and probably in other markets as well.

1496
01:23:32,720 --> 01:23:34,400
Speaker 3: All Right, I think that's going to have to do

1497
01:23:34,479 --> 01:23:36,200
Speaker 3: it for me. I can't say anything else.

1498
01:23:37,320 --> 01:23:40,479
Speaker 2: All right, Well, this was a fun one, and again

1499
01:23:40,560 --> 01:23:42,680
Speaker 2: we encourage Well, I hope you didn't make it through

1500
01:23:42,680 --> 01:23:47,960
Speaker 2: the whole episode without having ever seen Nasca. Hopefully you

1501
01:23:48,000 --> 01:23:49,639
Speaker 2: went out and you watched it. But hey, if it's

1502
01:23:49,640 --> 01:23:51,160
Speaker 2: been a while since you've seen it, go out and

1503
01:23:51,200 --> 01:23:52,720
Speaker 2: watch it again. It's like I say, this is a

1504
01:23:52,720 --> 01:23:56,160
Speaker 2: film where the message speaks to us today, you know,

1505
01:23:56,320 --> 01:23:58,120
Speaker 2: just as well as it spoke to us back in

1506
01:23:58,200 --> 01:24:00,920
Speaker 2: nineteen eighty four. Time. If you would like to check

1507
01:24:00,960 --> 01:24:03,960
Speaker 2: out other episodes of Weird House Cinema, what publishes every

1508
01:24:04,000 --> 01:24:06,120
Speaker 2: Friday in the Stuff to Blow Your Mind podcast feed.

1509
01:24:06,160 --> 01:24:09,759
Speaker 2: We're primarily a science podcast with core episodes on Tuesdays

1510
01:24:09,760 --> 01:24:12,640
Speaker 2: and Thursdays, but Fridays we set aside for just a

1511
01:24:12,680 --> 01:24:16,479
Speaker 2: discussion of a weird or fantastic film. If you want

1512
01:24:16,520 --> 01:24:18,240
Speaker 2: to see a full list of all the movies we've

1513
01:24:18,240 --> 01:24:21,080
Speaker 2: covered over the years, you can go to letterboxed dot com.

1514
01:24:21,120 --> 01:24:23,719
Speaker 2: That's l E T T e r box d dot com.

1515
01:24:24,040 --> 01:24:26,760
Speaker 2: Our user the handle there is weird House, and we

1516
01:24:26,800 --> 01:24:28,439
Speaker 2: have a list of all the movies and you can

1517
01:24:28,760 --> 01:24:31,200
Speaker 2: do all sorts of neat things where you can, you know,

1518
01:24:31,280 --> 01:24:34,000
Speaker 2: can list them by genre and so forth. If you're

1519
01:24:34,000 --> 01:24:36,240
Speaker 2: just interested in the animated films, for instance, you can

1520
01:24:36,400 --> 01:24:38,519
Speaker 2: click that tab and just see the animated ones that

1521
01:24:38,640 --> 01:24:40,600
Speaker 2: sort of thing. And I also blog about these at

1522
01:24:40,680 --> 01:24:42,120
Speaker 2: summut to music dot com.

1523
01:24:42,320 --> 01:24:45,680
Speaker 3: Huge thanks to our excellent audio producer Jjposway. If you

1524
01:24:45,680 --> 01:24:47,639
Speaker 3: would like to get in touch with us with feedback

1525
01:24:47,680 --> 01:24:49,960
Speaker 3: on this episode or any other, to suggest a topic

1526
01:24:50,000 --> 01:24:52,240
Speaker 3: for the future, or just to say hello, you can

1527
01:24:52,280 --> 01:24:55,040
Speaker 3: email us at contact at stuff to Blow your Mind

1528
01:24:55,160 --> 01:25:02,519
Speaker 3: dot com.

1529
01:25:02,760 --> 01:25:05,680
Speaker 1: Stuff to Blow your Mind is production of iHeartRadio. For

1530
01:25:05,760 --> 01:25:09,600
Speaker 1: more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,

1531
01:25:09,680 --> 01:25:11,479
Speaker 1: or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.