Princess Mononoke by Hayao Miyazaki - Movie Review Example

Movie “Princess Mononoke” The Movie “Princess Mononoke” directed by Hayao Miyazaki is one thrilling encounter that demonstrates the conflict present between humans and nature. It also demonstrates the selfish nature of human beings when dealing with other creatures. The development of the movie also brings out the premise that humans cannot act positively unless the action they would take is beneficial to them. All the main human characters in the movie have varied interests which portrays selfishness. On the other hand, the non-human characters in the movie represent creatures that struggle for their survival, which is threatened by human beings. This paper will discuss the development of the movie touching on various major themes developed. It will discuss the issue of incapability of harmony, selfishness by human beings as well as humans being triggered to bring about a difference. Introduction The director of the movie, Hayao Miyazaki demonstrates the constant conflict between human beings and other non-human creatures. He suggests that human beings are selfish and do not care for the benefit or plight of the other creature or nature. He maintains visual accords between the horrifying violence and the awesome beauty. The movie director also adds an aspect of expectancy to the episode through the view point of Ashitaka as the story ends in a catastrophic hunt for the forest spirit. His demonic illness forces him to cause fatal disasters upon his opponents who struggle to renovate and maintain peace (Fortier, 3). The background of the movie occurred historically in Japan in the Muromachi era (1392-1573). This happened when the weapons first begun to appear in the country. A powerful ogre gains entry in the peaceful village of Ashitaka, who was a young warrior. The ogre plows with surpassing abhorrence towards the village, intending to annihilate it and execute every human it can find. The hatred grew stronger in the monster that the very grass it ran across wilted away to a brown mush. However, Ashitaka finally defeats the demon and speaks to the gathered creatures with its dying breath. The ogre informs the villagers that he was a great boar protector-god with the aim of destroying humans who had already caused destruction in his forest. The boar curses Ashitaka in the form of an overwhelming disease in his arm. As its already-dead body falls down, it utters a scathing curse on humanity (Potter, 1). Development of the Major theme of the Movie The movie starts in a certain village located at the edge of a large forest. Prince Ashitaka, a young warrior, discovers a fierce beast in the forest while on a watchtower. He quickly discovers that this particular beast wanted to devour the village and this young warrior purposed to defend his village. He also realizes that this beast has weird writhing tentacles ready to attack. The tentacles were also separate, showing that t was actually a giant boar god. Although this creature was once a majestic creature, it was evident that it now had evil madness (Cook, 3). Despite the beast being very fierce-looking, this young worrier does not fear it; rather he attacks it with all his strength. He draws the attention of the beast, and the creature starts advancing towards him. He attacks the beast with an arrow and eventually defeats it in a breathtaking encounter (Madison, 3). However, after killing the beast, it poisons Ashitaka with its evil, flowing through the veins. At first, Ashitaka does not mind the poison in his body, but later he learns that he would eventually die (Leong, 4). After this encounter, a certain woman in his village tells hem that the poison was in the form of a curse. This woman also told Ashitaka that if he does not receive treatment, the curse would eventually spread to the rest of his body and kill him. The woman also told Ashitaka that the only way out was to look for cure in the west. This was the direction where the beast had come from. Accompanied by his red elk Yakul, Ashitaka starts the journey in search of the cure. Yakul was very loyal to Ashitaka and very brave (Madison, 4). As they progressed to look for the cure, they encounter some forest warriors that Ashitaka defeats easily. He easily overcame these guys since he had already defeated the beast, which was actually more dangerous. He used his bow efficiency to fight them. In addition, Ashitaka utilized his demon-possessed hand to fire arrows at a very high speed. This success encouraged Ashitaka to continue with the search for a cure (Madison, 5). He travels through valleys, streams and thick forests and finally comes to the Iron Town. He discovered that the people living in this town sourced their livelihood from iron mining. These people used any means available to them to mine this iron from the hills, which angered the forest gods. Ashitaka realized that this was the primary reason the forest gods became very angry prompting to attack these people (Potter, 5). The leader of this town is Lady Eboshi, who aims at attacking the forest and its inhabitants to get access to iron. She gains much support from the inhabitants of her town due to her treatment powers. She treated these people compassionately, particularly those affected by leprosy. Due to this, the people living in this town deemed her as a philanthropic person, who carried the plight of her people in her heart. The director of the movie, Hayao Miyazaki portrays lady Eboshi as a leader who harms other people to help her own people. Though her intentions might be noble, they eventually harm human beings as in the case of Ashitaka (Cook, 6). The people living in this city led by Lady Eboshi did not have the interests of the forest and the animals therein at heart. The city people only concentrated on improving the industrial potential of the city but at the expense of the forests and its inhabitants. The soldiers of the city killed most of the animals in neighboring forests with gunpowder. The animal gods of these forests find it difficult to tolerate this threatened extinction of the animals. They therefore start attacking the destroying humans leading to more aggression and bloodshed between the two groups (Leong, 5). Ashitaka learns that the beast that attacked him was one of the forest gods, determined to revenge on the encroaching humans. These forest gods are mostly in the form of wolves determined to fight the human beings. It also emerges that Lady Eboshi vows to destroy all the surrounding forests so that she can expand the industrial activities of the city. Ashitaka also learns that there is another human being determined to fight Lady Eboshi and the people of the city. This human being is a girl named San and she joined the wolves in the battle. San Attacks the town in full force, determined to wipe out all the inhabitants of the town. This results in a bloody battle in the forest as more alliances emerge for the sake of adding strength. This part becomes the most thrilling segment of the movie (Madison, 6). Miyazaki demonstrates that Lady Eboshi and San are fierce enemies, who sought to kill each other desperately. In addition, the young warrior, Ashitaka, endeavors to meet San so that he can understand her reasons for fighting Lady Eboshi and the entire town. Ashitaka does not know which side to support and he therefore prevents the fight between them. Miyazaki also demonstrates that the poisonous tentacles apparent on the infected arm of Ashitaka depicted the hatred between the two women (Cook, 8). As Ashitaka endeavors to bring tranquility and end the amenity between the two women, he realizes a menacing plot to slay the Forest Spirit, which threatens to exterminate the fragile balance between humankind and nature forever (Fortier, 2). The people living in the iron town continuously saw the forest as a wasted space and a source of their livelihood. They therefore cleared the forests for expansion of their city, without minding the existence of animals. On the other hand, the animals together with their gods saw the forest as a dwelling place and therefore require conservation. As a result, Ape-like creatures constantly try to plant trees on the mountain cleared of its trees by Lady Eboshi. In addition, Lady Eboshi tries to stop this planting of trees and in the process her soldiers attack the Ape-Like creatures planting the trees. This trend brings out one of the major themes of the movie, the impossibility of harmony between the two opposing sides. Each side is constantly working towards its own benefit without minding the interest of the other side (Cook, 7). Another major theme developed in the movie is the selfishness of human beings. One good example is that Jiko. This character goes to the iron town for the sole purpose of getting the head of the deer god from the forest. The main reason for this character being at this town is to get this head and take it to Mikado, in hopes of receiving a befitting prize from Mikado. Due to his self-centered nature, he does not care that he is executing a special creature. He only concentrates on the reward that he looks forward to receive after getting the head. This implies that Jiko only cares concerning the means of satisfying his life. This portrays selfishness by humans, with no regard for other creatures. In this sense, while the boars are struggling for their survival, in addition to what they deem to be fair, Jiko is just struggling for material things, which are secondary to life (TheOtaku.com, 5). Ashitaka also portrays another level of selfishness by human beings in the play. Although he seems to be the most caring and smart human, he also has the selfish nature depicted by humans without caring for other creatures. He portrays selfishness towards the gods of the forest after endeavoring to look for cure. He portrays this when he asks Okoto, whether he understand the way of curing his menace. Ashitaka also portrays selfishness when he talks to Moro. It was evident that he could not get along with Moro even for few minutes. This shows that Ashitaka did not understand other creatures just because they were not of the human species. He also showed how he only thought of his own species when he told Moro to let San go. He only did this since San was of his own species (TheOtaku.com, 6). Another major theme in the movie is that of humans only acting when forced by certain circumstances. Although Ashitaka emerges a hero in the play, it is evident that he acts after being propelled by the infectious disease. It emerges that Ashitaka could not have responded to the conflict that he met between the forest and the iron town if he did not acquire the infectious disease. He demonstrates that human beings cannot rise to make a difference or solve a problem until they require such an action or will benefit from the situation. The young warrior meets a person on his journey, who tells him that the whole world is under a curse. The director of the movie suggests that the curse that Ashitaka gets represents the constant conflict that human beings constantly have with nature (Cook, 4). Conclusion The movie “Princess Mononoke” offers a special encounter between humans and non-human creatures as well as nature. The young warrior, Ashitaka kills an intruding beast as a way of protecting his fellow human beings. In addition, after the beast infects Ashitaka with an infectious disease, this young warrior looks for cure desperately. It emerges that the reason behind the attack by the beast, was the unceasing attack of the forest by humans without caring for the welfare of animals living there. The Iron Town, led by Lady Eboshi carries mass destruction of the forest and animals living there for their selfish gains. This angers the gods of the animals, who vows to attack the destructive humans. The entire movie shows how the actions of humans hurt other non-human creatures without caring. It also reveals the selfishness by humans, where they act to satisfy their needs at the expense of other non-human creatures and nature. The humans do not seem to even try to understand the plight of these non-human creatures. The movie is a perfect demonstration of the way humans are self-centered, greedy and uncaring when dealing with non-human creatures. Works Cited Cook, Adam. Princess Mononoke. 2010. Web. Fortier, Marc. Princess Mononoke (1997). 2007. Web. Leong, Anthony. Princess Mononoke Movie Review. 1999. Web. Madison, David. Unreal Movie Vault: Princess Mononoke (1997). 2010. Web. Potter, Dan. Movie Review: Princess Mononoke. 1999. Web. TheOtaku.com. Analysis of Princess Mononoke. 2008. Web. Read More