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#414 - When Marnie Was There
Hirosama Yonebayashi, 2014
When a young city girl with asthma is sent to live with relatives in the countryside, she strikes up a friendship with a mysterious girl who lives in a supposedly abandoned mansion.
When Marnie Was There is the final film produced by Studio Ghibli before the company officially went on hiatus, with the possibility that it may be the renowned studio's final film ever hanging over it and possibly influencing one's perception of it. The same feeling of finality ran through my mind when I watched Hayao Miyazaki's last directorial effort The Wind Rises earlier this year. Fortunately, When Marnie Was There amply lives up to the staggering expectations heaped upon it, and it does so with an admittedly simple storyline that is nonetheless fleshed out with all the things that make Ghibli great (save for excessive amounts of fantasy). Instead, When Marnie Was There takes an approach that involves magical realism with its tried-and-true premise centring on Anna, a 12-year-old city girl heading to the countryside in order to get some fresh air and recover from some recent asthma trouble. Aside from having a physical illness, she also has some trouble relating to others and appears to have depression as well, even as she encounters multiple locals who are willing to accommodate her. Things change when she discovers an abandoned mansion on the edge of some marshland that appears to come alive after dark. There, she meets and eventually befriends the titular Marnie, a blonde girl who seems to be a ghost but claims to be real.
As with any Ghibli film worth its salt, the visuals are top-notch even though there is nothing overly inventive about them - compared to Miyazaki films full of fantastic creatures and elaborate world-building, it's a decidedly mundane affair. This is not a strike against it; if anything, it's a point in its favour that it's able to construct a sufficiently compelling narrative even while being more grounded in realism than your average Ghibli effort. It's sentimental without being mawkish and one can definitely sympathise with Anna even when she makes mistakes, while there are no genuine villains to be found anywhere (except perhaps in the case of a handful of strict guardians on Marnie's side of the story, but they are not major antagonists). Instead, the conflict emanates from Anna trying to figure out Marnie's full story while also learning to confront certain issues regarding her status as a foster child and her general sense of loneliness, which does go into some extremely emotional areas as the film progresses (though an experienced audience member may be able to pick what's likely to unfold before it actually does in certain places). The resulting film ends up being an all-around stunning piece of work in terms of both ostensible style and narrative substance. While I'm not inclined to think of it as a contender for the best film Studio Ghibli ever produced, I reckon that, in very much the same way that The Wind Rises was the right film for Miyazaki to retire on, so too is When Marnie Was There a good film with which Studio Ghibli can conclude an extremely phenomenal run.
Hirosama Yonebayashi, 2014
When a young city girl with asthma is sent to live with relatives in the countryside, she strikes up a friendship with a mysterious girl who lives in a supposedly abandoned mansion.
When Marnie Was There is the final film produced by Studio Ghibli before the company officially went on hiatus, with the possibility that it may be the renowned studio's final film ever hanging over it and possibly influencing one's perception of it. The same feeling of finality ran through my mind when I watched Hayao Miyazaki's last directorial effort The Wind Rises earlier this year. Fortunately, When Marnie Was There amply lives up to the staggering expectations heaped upon it, and it does so with an admittedly simple storyline that is nonetheless fleshed out with all the things that make Ghibli great (save for excessive amounts of fantasy). Instead, When Marnie Was There takes an approach that involves magical realism with its tried-and-true premise centring on Anna, a 12-year-old city girl heading to the countryside in order to get some fresh air and recover from some recent asthma trouble. Aside from having a physical illness, she also has some trouble relating to others and appears to have depression as well, even as she encounters multiple locals who are willing to accommodate her. Things change when she discovers an abandoned mansion on the edge of some marshland that appears to come alive after dark. There, she meets and eventually befriends the titular Marnie, a blonde girl who seems to be a ghost but claims to be real.
As with any Ghibli film worth its salt, the visuals are top-notch even though there is nothing overly inventive about them - compared to Miyazaki films full of fantastic creatures and elaborate world-building, it's a decidedly mundane affair. This is not a strike against it; if anything, it's a point in its favour that it's able to construct a sufficiently compelling narrative even while being more grounded in realism than your average Ghibli effort. It's sentimental without being mawkish and one can definitely sympathise with Anna even when she makes mistakes, while there are no genuine villains to be found anywhere (except perhaps in the case of a handful of strict guardians on Marnie's side of the story, but they are not major antagonists). Instead, the conflict emanates from Anna trying to figure out Marnie's full story while also learning to confront certain issues regarding her status as a foster child and her general sense of loneliness, which does go into some extremely emotional areas as the film progresses (though an experienced audience member may be able to pick what's likely to unfold before it actually does in certain places). The resulting film ends up being an all-around stunning piece of work in terms of both ostensible style and narrative substance. While I'm not inclined to think of it as a contender for the best film Studio Ghibli ever produced, I reckon that, in very much the same way that The Wind Rises was the right film for Miyazaki to retire on, so too is When Marnie Was There a good film with which Studio Ghibli can conclude an extremely phenomenal run.