This is by the son, not the master. As a Studio Ghibli piece, it's not bad, no Ghibli film is ever bad. It's just not there yet. The things we all know and love about Ghibli- the clouds, the sky, the Joe Hisaishi piano driven music are absent. Those things gave time to take in the majesty of the piece, and to think about the action- so rare in a piece of animation.That was one of the most salient points about Japanese animation- there was time to think. Disney is forever action and then the song- then more action. This has very little, in fact none of it, and the music is from the western action-action-action school. Many cuts are just plain irritating- they're too quick and what follows is not a progression or step forward- they're just jarring. The remedy comes with improving technique- easily rectified by experience and age. That said the story seems to be truncated and not having read any of this sort of book- as Clive James said- I too was inoculated against mythical beasts and magic at an early age- I find there's perhaps too many things going on. There's the court scene- we never go back for a resolve- the dragons- seem to be just there as dragons and could have been just as easily sheep, whales or guinea pigs. But without them there wouldn't have been a wow! Totoro had many wow objects- the tree, the Totoro itself, the Catbus. Spirted Away had legions of wow things. The spirits, the dragon, the witch, the railway, the bathhouse. Princess Mononoke had the Akudama, the forge, the boar beast, the great forest spirit, the battles. Tales From Earthsea had some of the same feel as The Little Norse Prince- one of the early Ghiblis- with which it shares its semi-Nordic/Celtic scenery. Overall it's good, but it's not great.
Review of Tales from Earthsea
