Mononoke Hime (Princess Mononoke)
Miyazaki HayaoPrincess Mononoke
Miyazaki Hayao
Class Notes
Week 14
Anime
Mononoke Hime (Princess Mononoke)
Miyazaki Hayao
Princess Mononoke
Miyazaki Hayao
Terms
Jidaigeki anime: an anime set in a historical or in this case, mythical time
Tataru “to curse” or "to bring evil on"
Tatarigami: a god that curses (translated as "demon god" in the film
There are four “titles” that can be translated as Mr., Mrs. Ms., or Miss. They distinction is by level of formality and or respect There are in descending order:
Sama
San
Chan or Kun
Occurs with kin titles too. Ani-sama is used respectfully for a fictive “older brother” is used at the start of the film.
These forms can be attached to given or family names, occupations and so forth.
Kami/gami: god, sacred, holy, supernatural force. Generally a Shin’too concept
Manga: a kind of comic book
Otaku passionate followers of Manga
People, Supernaturals and places:
Yamato: ethnic Japanese
Ainu: The aboriginal population of Japan (like American Indians here)
Ashitaka: member of the Emishi (possibly meant to be Ainu – beards) Cursed by Tatarigami.
Moro: Wolf “mother” of San
San: Child raised by wolf Moro, known as Mononoke Hime. Mononoke means “a supernatural who has taken the form of a Princess”
Kodama: Little things living in the forest (word means "echo" or "tree spirit")
Eboshi: Head of Tataraba Town
Mononoke: Something (usually a supernatural) which has been transformed into something. In the case of Mononoke Hime a supernatural transformed into a princess.
Tataraba: town where manufacturing is going on. The word seems to have the tataru stem in it, but it should be tatariba rather than tataraba.
Aarne Thompson Motif index: An index documenting universal and near universal fokloric motifs.
Before the film
Animation in the west and in Japan is quite different in a number of ways. Although we can innumerate them it begins to look like Japan or the us does “more” of this or “less” of that, whereas the difference is not just percentages.
One of the more important differences is that some things in Japan have a broader viewership than in the US. Puppets for example, especially Bunraku is a major form of state supported adult entertainment (generally not liked by children) whereas in the West, puppets have tended to be seen as a form of children’s entertainment although there is some, rather rare adult entertainment done with puppets. Japan has labeled several of its puppeteers and chanters national treasures. The US is nowhere near this.
Similarly cartoons are generally seen in the west as children’s entertainment, although clearly some X-rated cartoons like The Cat were rated in such a way that children were barred from them.
Sex is Japan is seen as natural. Fertility and reproduction are overt in Shintoo for example, and despite the bible’s edict to “Go forth and multiply” sex is a forbidden topic.
What kinds of things typify anime from a cinematic point of view?
Obviously drawings and lack of movement in background, but in terms of shot, camera work etc.? How does this differ from Western animation?
POSTMODERNISM
Postmodernism like most theories fits its time so as art works are produced now with a post modern aesthetic (if it can be called that) postmodern analysis seems likely to “fit”.
Post modern terms generally try to “create” new words (jargon) since they are usually involved in expressing the ineffable. Here are s few that are crucial:
Most import are
subvert
Problemitize
Postmodernism is interested in "alternate" approches, most often those that the postmodernists themselves are interested in:
Gender, minorities, and especially the way these are "subverted" or "problematized"
THEMES
What kind of themes in this film are universal? Do you recognize any from non-Japanese culutres including the West?
The title of the film has to do with a tranformed Princess. What is the nature of transformation in this film?
Sacredness and relationship to madness and possession
AFTER THE FILM
Use of the past or in this case mythical time to reflect on present
What kind of photography typifies anime:
Tracking shots
Long view establishing shots
Fancy pans
Unusual point of view camera angles
Extreme close ups
Western cartoons tend to be
Action obsessed middle distance
DISTORTION OF STEREOTYPES (Subversion!)
Japanese and Nature
Some argue that Japanese are seen by themselves and others as nature lovers (oriented).
We have pointed out that this is also a problem. Japanese do NOT love all things in nature:= volcanoes, earthquakes mud slides The natural element here is painted as both friendly and dangerous. Thus it is not a “subversion” as has been claimed, remember wind and rain and such in other films. Japanese are “fit” into the landscape.
ROLE OF NATURE
Both dangerous and friendly and necessary to people.
Human destruction of nature (from west? Western society – gun powder etc)
Wolves, boars are seen potentially violent as is San.
Rain before wolf attack
Rain before beginning of apocalypse (boar attack, hunt fo Deer God, etc.)
VIOLENCE
Violence unreal – compare samurai films and horror or monster films
MONEY, MERCHANTS AND CORRUPTION
Money as corrupting (gold stone makes people hearts like the frayed ends of a string of hemp
Merchants recognize money, not gold stone
GENDER
Standard "myth": Japanese women are submissive
Film inverts (subverts) this idea and has dominant powerful women
Women are often unusual in Miyazaki films – seen as more powerful etc. (Is this subversion?)
Leading roles are three females:
Tararaba
Place of industry also care of minorities – women, lepers, etc.
THEMES: Universal and Otherwise
What kind of themes in this film are universal? Do you recognize any from non-Japanese culutres including the West?
Wound as force for action: Parsifal
Marking by supernatural (Cain)
Even those may be universal they may have different meaning is different cultures.
Transformations
The title of the film has to do with a tranformed Princess. What is the nature of transformation in this film?
Animal/Gods and people share many characteristics (speech, feelings etc.)
Transformations like rites of passage often inply liminal (threshhold of a door) dangerous state.
Daily and Annual Cycles:
Matches changes of Deer god, daily changes to Night walker and back, annual appearance growth and "death" of planets etc.
Change also in society:
"pristine" world => modern, industrialized
"Subversion" women dominate (most laughter in film is by femle characters toward males)
Ashitaka as mediator of conflicts - wants town and forest to live together
Death and rebirth
What does it mean that San and Ashikata do not stay together, but that the cars are healed? Does the fact that they plan to visit mean something significant?
Trust yields cooperation: Ashitaka trusts kodama in getting through forest. Men trust wolf cub when they lift the dead body of the boars.
Niebelungen: when the goddess of youth is kidnapped the Gods age
The film is set in a mythological time when the world is not as it is now. Most mythologies in the world are like that: there is a world, but without humans and the world has to be transformed for humans arrivals.
The film starts with a "demon god" who "generates" snake like appendages as a result of internal hate and anger. Touching the "god" produces deadly burn marks. Hate and anger are contageous.
People are interactive in a very real way to the animal spirits of the time. The oracle offers to "build a mound" and makes offerings to the "demon god" to calm its spirit. Later Ashitaka will ask permission from the kodama to pass through their forest. He is respectful to the three that is their mother.
Most of the people in the story are outcasts. San has no parents around but lives with the wolves, and to some degree believes herself to be one of them, hating humans. The Iron Works are filled with former prostitutes and lepers. Ashitaka's people have been driven out and to the Northeast.
People's bodies are also significant in that after the touching of the demon god, Ashitaka's arm seems to act on it's own. The lepers have distorted bodies. The societal body is also problematic.
There is a growing loss of spirituality. People are killing the gods with guns and the world and hence society is transforming. San, who was human has become more animal like. Ashitaka has become more supernatural. He is able to survive gunshots, he can open a door it takes ten men to open and so on. The sexes are also merging. Both san and Ashitaka are outcasts; eachsaves the other from death, each has their mount shot out from under them.
Life is validated. People should live, This is the final message of the deer god according to Ashitaka. No matter how changed the society becomes, it is better to keep on. Even though the gods are dead, spirituality is lost, the cycles ofday and night, and the year continue although possibly viewed now differently. A force of life and death exists but need not be deified.
Ashitaka wants to find a middle ground. We can't have the old ways again, but the new ways can not replace them, they must be mediated. San remains in the wild, and Ashitaka goes off to the new town that will be built - this time a "good" town according to Eboshi, although justs what that means is unclear.
The film is far more about change (and role change is part). The opening tatarigame has changed from the “boar god” to the tatarigami; Ashitaka changes from unmarked to marked (by the scar) and then from live to dead to live; the shishigami changes from the deer shape in the day time to the “night walker” at night; the forest goes from being alive to being dead and back to being alive and so on. Political control goes from (unshown) male to female. The world changes from mythical to modern.
Change which simplyreverse social hierarchies is not cyclical, and hence does not resolve the merger of the old with the new. Changing rule from men to women is not the solution, it is the natural cyclical change from day to night and through the season from spring to winter and around again. Change needs not to reverse, but to be mediated. Changing power from male to female or from past to present is not the solution, it is how are these re-integrated – the argument constantly made by Ashitaka. So shortly after Eboshi loses her arm to the wolf (I suppose Freud would take that as a symbolic castration of Eboshi) she makes a statement that they will rebuild the town but this time a “good” town. What does that mean? Mediated? In what way?
Ashitaka is something like the hero(?) of Harp of Burma, wandering to deal with the dead bodies – that is mediating the two sides of the war and being humanistic.
This may explain why the title deals with transformation. The film is about the transformation of society and how it transforms relative to environmental issues, political power (relative to gender to some degree), and so on.
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Click on the title of the film for notes on that film:
Mononoke: human, but lives with and identifies with animals
Moro: wolf mother, nurturing but lethal
Oboshi: human, female in charge of town
Ashitaka
Transformation from animal to person and back.
Child raised by animals. Romulus Remus
Boar says something neither human nor animal is coming (hunters - humans dressed as animals)
Boars: God =>Tatarigami
San: ?=>Girl who becomes wolf who becomes ....?
Ashitaka: alive=>dead=>alive
Forest: live=>dead=>live
Deer God: Deer God=>Night Walker=Deer God
Day=>night;
spring=>summer=>fall=>winter
Wife of saved man more dominant
Women defend town
Is town ruled by woman any better than one rules by men?
Mediation allows both. What is meant by Eboshi's statement that they will make a "good town"
Parallels:
Word for crazy in Chinese “Divine nervousness) Shinkei Sanging
Sacredness and relationship to madness and possession (divine inhabitation)
Rituals for dead animals (Japan, Eskimo) etc
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