A Majestic, Unusual Gift to the World : ‘The Boy and the Heron’ Review

We know that The Boy and the Heron is the new critically-acclaimed fantasy adventure from the legendary Studio Ghibli, creators of Spirited Away, Howl’s Moving Castle, and My Neighbor Totoro. Like I said in my film teaser reaction, this film seemed to have glimpses of several older Ghibli films: fire and destruction which may be a nod to war or some great tragedy, unique characters whom we can speculate could be spirits or otherworldly beings, a child entering a unique doorway or gate which looks to lead to a place much different than their own reality with its own set of rules an individual perhaps offering a deal to the main character –and I wasn’t wrong. While watching in a theater, I felt that I saw sparks of some of my favorite Ghibli films and yet…The Boy and the Heron marks a new chapter in the studio’s work. It is something new, an entirely new animal, if you will. A NOT Spoiler Free Review follows below The Boy and the Heron follows a young boy named Mahito yearning for his mother. He eventually ventures into a world shared by the living and the dead. This is a place where death and life constantly dance with each other and a person passing in Mahito’s world means that he might find them, or a version of them, in this other world that he has descended to. With that in mind, I’m not overreacting when I say that a lot of The Boy and the Heron is unsettling: there are scenes upon scenes of Mahito, the protagonist of the film, nearly washed away by waves, nearly eaten…