2. The Wind Rises
Grade: AMy Take: Japanese auteur Hayao Miyazaki has made an indelible mark on the field of animation by making such all-time classics as My Neighbor Totoro and the Oscar-winning Spirited Away. Shortly after the debut of his newest film at the Venice Film Festival, Miyazaki announced his retirement, making The Wind Rises the final film in the directors oeuvre. While it's disappointing that there will never be another new Miyazaki film again, The Wind Rises is a brilliant note to end on. The Wind Rises is a biopic of Jiro Horikoshi, a 20th Century Japanese engineer who designed the infamous "zero" planes that the Japanese used during World War II. While Miyazaki has worked almost exclusively in the field of fantasy in his career, The Wind Rises makes me lament the fact that Miyazaki didn't take on more real world subjects. Of course, as with all of Miyazaki's films, The Wind Rises is stunningly gorgeous, rivaling Gravity this year as the most beautiful aesthetic experience of 2013. What may be more surprising though is just how adept Miyazaki is at handling this type of non-fiction story. The film, which is very slowly and deliberately paced, harkens back to some of the classic biopics of the 1930's and 1940's (as well as films like Lawrence of Arabia) in that it is primarily focused on the nature of its central character and not so much what the character does. The film has a certain aimless feeling to it, as there is no real end point that the protagonist is trying to reach. The merits of this approach though is that it gives us a deep insight to Jiro, whose personality is that of the quintessential engineer, endlessly fascinated and in love with the design of life. As an amateur student of Japanese history, The Wind Rises also has a painfully accurate understanding of pre-war Japan that may be the best depiction of the country ever put to film and was endlessly fascinating to watch.
Oscar Prospects: Other than the ghetto category of Best Animated Feature, animated movies have a tough road to toll if they want to try get recognition outside this designated play area, particularly when they're not Pixar movies. As good as The Wind Rises is though, for modern day audiences it will simply be too legitimately old-fashioned for a reaction beyond, "That was nice enough". However, given Miyazaki's reputation and the relatively weak animated feature field this year, I fully expect The Wind Rises to receive a Best Animated Feature nomination, and if there is any justice in this world, it should win the Oscar as well. Regardless of the movie's ultimate Oscar fate though, I do urge you to check it out, as The Wind Rises is (in my mind) easily one of the best films of the young decade.