15 Best Films Of 2016 (So Far)
2. When Marnie Was There
When Marnie Was There may be the final Studio Ghibli film. The studio has taken a "brief pause" in the wake of anime godfather Hayao Miyazaki's retirement and it's currently unclear when they'll get back to work. Although based on what's here in Marnie, there's enough ingenuity in the younger blood to keep the studio going for years to come.
If it is the final film, then they've gone out on a worthy high. Obviously it's an absolutely gorgeous movie - like a sketch comes to life, there's that dependable attention to specific details (a raindrop on a tomato plant, the displacement of sand when running through a marsh) drawing your focus to certain fabrics of the reality - but what really strikes is its dream-like story.
Like Hiromasa Yonebayashi's previous film, Arriety, this is based on a British book, yet manages to infuse the Anglo story with Japansese themes, here a fluid spiritualism that makes what could be corny turns into something highly insightful. It's on the one hand highly intimate, honing in on twelve year-old Anna's struggles, yet through her interactions with the enigmatic Marnie expands into a film spanning (and, in some ways, redefining) the ideas of generations. To explain its heft would be a spoiler, but the final act is so deftly handled you'd need a heart of stone to not tear up.