Ranked #1433

Gedo Senki

I realize that many people might not agree with what i'm going to say about this film, but please hear me out..

first of all.. i think too many people expected it to be like other miyazaki works.. but the worst thing you could do is assume it'll have the magic and light-heartedness of other studio ghibli films.. after all, it was miyazaki's son that directed it.. and for a first film, i don't think it could've been any better.. i suppose it's tough to keep this in mind, as the art style is the same as other ghibli films.. but please try..

that being said..

Story-i loved the story.. that might be partially because i really enjoy this genre.. a sort of medieval setting with fantasy elements.. dragons and sorcery.. but none of the fantasy elements are too over-bearing.. the film focuses instead on the lesson it intends to convey.. sounds lame.. but i think it did a perfect job of getting the point across.. i felt like i would burst when the movie ended.. i really felt the impact of what was being said.. to deny death is to deny life.. being afraid of death is being afraid of living.. i know it sounds cliche, but it makes sense and it really hits home.. heh.. for me at least.. it's a very epic telling of the story.. and you need to keep in mind also that this was literature to begin with, and you can tell by the content of the story.. it may seem to move a bit quickly and is at parts confusing.. but that's just the way it goes whenever literature becomes film.. nothing tough to keep up with though.. just a few holes..

Animation-the scenery was breathtaking as usual.. you could really feel the tone of the setting.. the art, the music, the story-all truly strike a chord.. the character animations could have been better, that would be my only serious complaint.. since it's a more recent film, i thought they could have done more with the effects-especially in scenes involving the use of magic.. more similar to the animation in spirited away or howl's moving castle.. then again, it might have been intentional.. and i'm not sure i liked the design of the dragons.. but overall.. great stuff.

Sound-probably my favorite music in a film ever.. bah.. i love that stuff.. perfectly orchestrated.. gave me chills actually.. heh.. it was dramatic, but it added to the epic feel of the film.. it was never cheesy.. and i especially love when it sounded a bit irish with the flutes and such.. and uh.. the closing song made me break down and bawl like a baby.. it was that beautiful.

Character-the characters were totally fitting for this movie.. nothing felt like it was out of place.. the main characters had plenty of depth and were very likable.. one thing i noticed was that one of the leaders of the bad dudes, the guy with the frenchie stupid-lookin mustache, looks exactly like a bad guy in nausicaa valley of the wind.. this also, may have been on purpose.. he acted like him too.. kinda weird.. and the evil sorcerer gave me chills.. that voice.. shudder*.. so yea-the characters were perfect in my opinion.. enough said.

Enjoyment-i enjoyed it thoroughly.. yea.. that's all.


*please remember to watch this film with an open mind, not expecting the usual miyazaki 'magic' read more

Let me explain first that I am not a Studio Ghibli fan. I find when I watch their films that I am constantly seeing the same recurring characters. Not the same TYPE of characters, just the same art. That greatly bugs me. I saw many of the same archetype characters that i've seen in every Ghibli film in this one as well.

Story: Adapted from Ursula K LeGuins Earthsea series. I've never read the series myself but from watching the anime I might just pick up a couple. I want to ask what part of the story inspired Goro Miyazaki to want to direct this. There's nothing in here that really justifies creating an anime. The major problem I find is that all the times they could be doing alot of character scenes the characters are really doing nothing. This takes way too long and there are entire scenes that don't do anything to contribute. The action that happens in this anime is very....inconsistent. There were a few scenes that I thought were really well done and others that left me bewildered, and not in a good way.

Art: For a 2006 movie it was desperately mediocre. The art was very basic and the characters where very Ghibli...men have gigantic beards and women all look the same. There were a couple marketplace scenes that I paused to take a look at some of the art and it was pretty decent, but for the rest of the scenes I was bored. If you really want a comparison...watch Totoro or Porco Rosso and then watch this and scene how the art has barely improved.

Sound: I remember being slightly bothered by the music occasionally....but not too much. There are definitely better soundtracks out there but there are probably worse ones if you searched hard enough.

Character: When the art is lacklustre an anime is based completely on the story and the characters. The characters in this anime spend too much time being ambiguous and not enough time bonding with each other. There's alot of anger swelling in the two younger characters and it comes off mainly as angst instead of anger.

Enjoyment: I did not enjoy this anime. Even now I can't really remember anything of it, which is usually a bad sign. As far as Goro Miyazaki's first film...it isn't great...but it isn't terrible either, he'd work alot better in a different studio. read more

I'm not sure what Ursula K. LeGuin made of the adaptation of her Earthsea saga, but let me warn you now that Studio Ghibli did not do for Tales from Earthsea what Peter Jackson did for the Lord of the Rings trilogy. But that aside, this is actually a good movie.

I know that this movie has been panned a lot by both fans and critics, and I am not sure why. Perhaps nobody likes Goro Miyazaki? Were the Earthsea fans outraged? Was the expectation not met? I would not know--I seemed to have missed all or any hype surrounding this movie, and I tend not to have any partiality to or discontent with the director. So I watched Tales from Earthsea (or Gedo Senki) with an unbiased eye.

What we got was the story of a conflicted prince who is on the run from his kingdom for committing a terrible crime against his father. He meets a wizard named Ged who takes care of him and they travel to the city. A series of events land them in the home of an old friend of Ged's and her ward--a young girl named Therru. The four live there contentedly for a short time, until dark magic and an evil sorcerer threaten their lives. The problem with this movie was that for a story of such grand proportions, it seemed more like a contained slice of Arren's life. It wasn't exactly epic, I mean to say. There were sword battles, a kingdom torn, magic, dragons and conflict--yet it managed to only involve mainly Arren, Ged, Therru, their nemesis and a few of his lackeys. Not that there's a problem with the grandness or scale of the movie, but I suspect that other viewers wanted something more than Arren tilling the soil to then battling.

A major production generally has great artwork and animation, and Tales from Earthsea doesn't disappoint there. The character design had that traditionally Ghibli-esque plainness and simplicity. Backgrounds looked amazing. The city, the countryside--it looked great.

Sound too was very good. There's a song also incorporated into the movie, and it has the interesting, earthy vocals of Therru's seiyuu mixed in with an ethereal type of music. The music was composed to suit the atmosphere of the movie, and it does succeed in doing this.

The characters were not the best out there, but for what they were worth, they are good. Arren is a deeply troubled prince who seems to be suffering from self-identity issues. Therru is mysterious, and rightly so, and she has a strong, persevering attitude. The movie is named after Ged (he's the 'Gedo' from the title Gedo Senki), and while he is a presence, it doesn't feel as though he is the protagonist. He is a great supporting character; perhaps that is one of the problems with this movie--the most important character wasn't the protagonist. There was very little development on any of the minor characters' parts, and the villain seems to exist without rhyme or reason. As I said, no intriguing, excellent characters, but there is a cast full of decent ones that keep the story moving along.

While this is definitely one of Studio Ghibli's weaker productions, this movie isn't that bad. It has a passable story, some good characters, great technical value, and it wasn't mind-numbingly boring. Though, admittedly, the beginning of the movie seemed dull until Ged appeared. And there were instances when the plot lulled, but it picked back up each time.

Tales from Earthsea doesn't really take you into the fantastic, mythical, magical world of Earthsea--it lets you venture a little into it, but not too far, which is probably its downfall. Earthsea would have been an amazing place to see animated. For now, I suppose we have to settle for just a small part of it. read more

An epic story of a young prince with a dark side, a wise old wizard and a mysterious, scarred girl. I was so full of hope for this one.

At a first look, it looks like what you would expect; the art is very familiar, especially the character design; the detail of the latter Studio Ghibli movies present, with grandiose scenery and breathtaking settings; the music appropriate, ushering us into the right mood; yet... something is missing.

This is very serious movie, gone is the usual playfulness and humour; there is a strong lesson being taught throughout, not unlike in Mononoke Hime, warning us about how we treat the Earth and our lives. However, that plays almost a second fiddle to the characters, saving of the world doesn't seem as important as their own adventure.

Oh, I'm so torn. I've always been a big fan of Studio Ghibli and they can do no wrong. Almost. This time round, I wasn't "wowed". Don't get me wrong, this is not a bad movie, not by a long shot, but it just isn't Hayao Miyazaki. Off I go to re-watch Tonari no Totoro or Hauru no Ugoku Shiro. read more

Having only just finished watching Gedo Senki: Tales from Earthsea which was done by Miyazaki's son I have a few things to say. I am a Ghibli fan, and I was curious as to how Goro Miyazaki would make his first movie.Since I had already read the accompanying book "The Earthsea Trilogy" by Ursala K. Le Guin I expected to be disappointed, but I was curious as to what would disappoint me.

The story takes place some time after certain events in the book, but before the final events. So an audience that's never read the book will never find out why magic is failing, why the crops and animals are still dying, etc. Which is interesting because this is brought up in the begging, but then the story drifts off to the main plot. There was a lot more violence, dismemberment, and death in this movie that stood out in the film. It was darker and it did shroud it's characters well. I wasn't sure I liked it.

The movie does touch on some places that show up in the book, and if you did read the book you find out what happened to some characters that just disappeared after their part in the book.

The book's main character, Sparrowhawk, is a supporting character as we follow the boy Arren in the movie. I didn't particularly like this film because it isn't as deep as the other ghibli films I've seen, but the art is really really good.

All in all, the story itself, is definitely something different from what papa miyazaki does, and the characters aren't as easy to love, but if you're open to a different take to story telling then this movie might be one you should see.

read more

I had great expectations for Earthsea, mostly because I loved the song by Terru and the beautiful poster with the dragon. I'm disappointed to say the movie did not live to my expectations. You can't really sympathize with any of the characters, and even though the art is outstanding at times it's also plain. I couldn't believe how unimpressed I was with the town, the most colorful part of the movie.

The thing that really drags this movie down is the most important part: the story. Things happen with little to none reason (and those reasons are either stereotypical or absurd), the pace is dreadful; drags and drags you to hastily tie all the knots at the end. They show the unbalance of the world and almighty dragons at the beginning, but all that gets easily forgotten by the characters' conflicts. Although there is a connection between the world events with the characters intentions, it's a sloppy one.

It matters not if you're a Studio Ghibli fan or not, the truth is that the movie needed a better story-teller and a stable pace. Maybe if Hayao Miyazaki had put his pride aside and helped or supervised the movie in any way we could have ended up with a more polished movie, because Goro shows promise, but his inexperience shows. read more

Gedo Senki isn't a horrible movie by any means, certainly not. However, it is severely lacking. Given that this is Goro Miyazaki's first time out it is somewhat understandable how this turns out. The movie is absolutely beautiful to look at....and thats about it. The movie takes much too long to even get near even beginning the plot that by the time it decides to, the plot has to be mashed together haphazardly and nonsensically. What we're left with is that is full of beautiful scenes that ultimately amount to little or nothing. Nice looking but with a weakly executed story.

I will start off that I thoroughly enjoyed watching this movie. It differs from Miyazaki's work due to that it was made by his son Goro Miyazaki. I have read the tales of earthsea by ursla leguin. I enjoyed the books, but they had some flaws that significantly detracted from the plot. For example a important dialogue between the main character and his wife would be 1 page and then there would be 3 pages on an insignificant sea voyage. I don't mind vivid details, but at a point it just gets boring. On the other hand I found that this movie was quite fluid and moved along well. The art was beautiful with some aspects from other Miyazakis films. Overall I would recomend that you watch this movie. read more

I love this Anime, its the first Studio Ghibli film I've ever seen but I really enjoyed it. I love the story and the artwork.
I remember when I bought the DVD of this anime I was so excited and I was so looking forward to watching it.
Now I have watched it and I would be more than happy to see this anime again anytime.