The Wind Rises

Hayao Miyazaki, director of such magical and imaginative animated features as Princess Mononoke and the Oscar-winning Spirited Away is arguably Japan's most beloved filmmaker. The Oscar-nominated The Wind Rises is his swan song, a personal project inspired by the true story of idealistic engineer Jiro Horikoshi, an aviation pioneer who dreamed of making "beautiful airplanes" but was instead instructed to build a warplane, eventually creating the Zero for use in World War II. Through Jiro, who comes of age in 1920s Japan, viewers experience the 1923 earthquake, the great Tokyo fire, and the crippling depression, as well as the growing militarism that takes hold of the country and the culture (at one point, pacifist Jiro comes close to becoming a victim of Japan's version of the Communist witch-hunt). The Wind Rises was both celebrated and criticized in Japan, where some accused the film of whitewashing the militarism that sent the country into World War II. Miyazaki does in fact address the strident militarism here, albeit with a tone of regret and resignation. A modern landmark of hand-drawn animation in an era of computer-animated features, the English dub here features the voices of Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Emily Blunt. Highly recommended. (S. Axmaker)