It’s a decade since Hayao Miyazaki last made a feature and there probably isn’t another filmmaker whose return from retirement would elicit greater excitement. The man who gave us Spirited Away, Princess Mononoke and My Neighbour Totoro… Who co-founded the legendary Studio Ghibli… He’s back with the story of a young boy, Mahito, growing up in Japan during WWII, who meets a talking heron and must venture into a fantasy world in order to save his new stepmother.
Released in Japan without promotional fanfare this summer under the title How Do You Live, Miyazaki’s movie instantly became Ghibli’s biggest ever box office smash. Commentators were quick to point out that the film has several parallels with the filmmaker’s story: like Mahito, Miyazaki was born in 1941, his father worked in an airplane factory, and the family moved to the countryside after the fire bombing of Tokyo. Meanwhile the supernatural elements echo and reflect his recurring obsessions in configurations that will surprise and delight fans new and old. At 82, Miyazaki himself is still defiantly young at heart.
Community Partner
Japan
2023
Special Presentations
In Japanese with English subtitles
Violence
Book Tickets
Indigenous & Community Access
Indigenous Access Tickets Community Access Tickets Ticket Donation Requests
Credits
Producer
Toshio Suzuki
Screenwriter
Hayao Miyazaki
Director
Hayao Miyazaki
Hayao Miyazaki is a Japanese animator, filmmaker, and manga artist. As a co-founder of the fabled Studio Ghibli, he has attained international acclaim as a masterful storyteller and creator of Japanese animated feature films, and is widely regarded as one of the most accomplished filmmakers in the history of animation. Spirited Away (2001) is regularly cited as the greatest animated feature ever made. Miyazaki announced his retirement from filmmaking after The Wind Rises in 2013, but returns this year with The Boy and the Heron.
Filmography: My Neighbour Totoro (1988); Princess Mononoke (1997); Spirited Away (2001); Ponyo (2008); The Wind Rises (2013)
Missing VIFF? Check out what's playing at the VIFF Centre
Vivaldi and Me
Venice, 1716. Composer Antonio Vivaldi teaches at an orphanage for abandoned girls, and establishes a deep rapport with violinist Cecelia — but their collaboration is threatened by her impending arranged marriage.
Rear Window
James Stewart is the man who sees too much. "Jeff" Jeffries is a sports photographer waylaid by a broken leg, doomed to spend the summer in a wheelchair in his New York apartment. That's how he comes to witness a murder in the dead of night (or does he?).
Rose of Nevada
This disconcerting film from the director of Bait and Enys Men feels like a message from another era: two men sign on to a Cornish fishing trawler, but when they return to port they are welcomed into the community 30 years before they left...
To Die For
Buck Henry (The Graduate) wrote this acidic black comedy about a ruthless weather girl on the make (Nicole Kidman in her breakout role). A young Joaquin Phoenix is the dim teen she seduces on her way to achieving stardom.
Camp
Reeling from two devastating tragedies, Emily (Zola Grimmer) takes refuge at a summer camp for troubled youth, where she has been offered a position as counsellor. She finds friendship, but also something more unexpected, something truly troubling...
