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
Nechako: It Will Be a Big River Again
In the face of environmental destruction, two Nations fight to restore their river and a way of life.
Sweet Summer Pow Wow
After the local hit The Great Salish Heist, writer-director Darrell Dennis proves his versatility with this charming love story about two young people who meet cute on BC's Pow Wow circuit. Her mom wants her to become a lawyer, but Jinny loves to dance...
The Great Salish Heist
From the director of Sweet Summer Pow Wow, The Great Salish Heist is a scrappy indie Ocean's 11 with bags of charm and some authentic things to say about cultural colonialism. (Free relaxed screenings for National Indigenous Peoples Day.)
Angela's Shadow
When a socialite visits her nanny’s remote reserve, she discovers her Cree ancestry and delves into her new-found spiritual traditions to save herself and her newborn baby from her husband’s psychotic, and purity-obsessed racism.
The Heiress
Olivia de Havilland won the Oscar for playing Catherine, a shy and insecure young woman who blossoms under the courtship of handsome gentleman caller Morris (Montgomery Clift). Her wealthy father, Ralph Richardson, looks on with severe skepticism.