We have become accustomed to all these Ghibli feature length films with deep values in recent years, but once every while, they do release kiddie films like 'Ponyo', which seemed like an attempt to replicate the success of 'Tonari no Totoro'. The stories are similar in that they both tell the tale of a child's encounter with a mysterious kiddie bait (interesting enough, the word "ponyo" means "blobby" in Japanese), and the short adventure this child takes with the creature. Unlike 'Totoro', which has become an iconic masterpiece for Studio Ghibli (enough to be included in their logo), 'Ponyo' lacks the same level of magic because its story is a mess and there are too many useless themes. In addition, the subject character lacks the enigma because, well... it speaks.
The opening sequence was very enjoyable, conveying Ponyo's life in wander and beauty of the sea without a single word being spoken. However, I was a bit disappointed by the animation. Sure, it is detailed and fluid, but this is just the matter of budget per frame. It seemed very, very outdated with its coloring, like watching a classic Disney film rather than a 21st century Ghibli film. The "fish wave" scenes were spectacular, but otherwise, there is nothing in this film that we haven't seen before. While this retro hand-drawn cel style animation is certainly preferred by some and has its merits, I find it alarming that other animation studios have made a giant leaps in animation quality in the past few years while Ghibli, once industry benchmark in anime, have been largely unchanged... arguably even deteriorated in terms of quality since peaking out with 'Howl's Moving Castle'.
I have nothing but praise for musical score in this movie. All the pieces were fully orchestrated, and really sets the mood for every scene, whether it's a jolly comedy, exciting action, or mysterious fantasy moments. Sound mixing / volume adjustment was outstanding, such as the sudden spike in audio volume in a "chase" scene to show the impending danger, perfectly timed to what's happening on the screen. Every piece was obviously designed specifically for each scene, and the main theme music is very memorable, also used as the instrumental for the theme song sang by the little girl in the end. Unfortunately, there was a major miscast with the seiyuu in using old school dorama actress Yamaguchi Tomoko as the mother. Often typecast into tough female roles such as single businesswoman, she seems to be the perfect fit on paper as the strict mother of the protagonist. However, the character design simply seemed too "soft". Her voice acting experience being very limited, she ended up sounding overly unemotional in some scenes. She certainly is no Kimura Takuya when it comes voice acting.
The story development was forced in many occasions. There were quite a few face-palm scenes in this movie, like when Ponyo's father started talking to himself in an underwater scene just to explain the situation to the audience. It was hard to believe such reputable studio and director would resort to such poor storytelling technique. Another questionable scene was near the end, when the kid finds his washed away green bucket just as Ponyo was losing her power and returning to her fish state. It's a kiddie movie, but that is just way too convenient lazy writing.
The themes in this movie were also very confusing. As mentioned earlier, the concept is almost identical to that of 'Totoro'. But Ponyo herself is a ripoff of 'Little Mermaid' (and the forbidden love with human), and then they added Ryuuguu castle reference to fairy tale 'Urashima Taro', plus a tunnel reminiscent of the one in 'Spirited Away'. The water controlled by Ponyo's father also moved like the black goo from 'Mononoke Hime' (and the two subsequent Miyazaki Hayao films). Did they simply run out of ideas, or are they trying to capitalize on their past success?
There were three other scenes that I found very disturbing. First of which occurred while Ponyo was transforming in the water bubble, and her "sisters" come for help. It must have been a symbolism to a new birth, representing multiple sperms trying to penetrate the ovum. The second one occurred near end of the movie, when a mother of a newborn baby was explaining the process of breast milk production. The final one occurs shortly after when they enter the underwater castle, another sperm race to ovum entry scene. The whole movie was presented as a children's movie, and these three scenes had absolutely no place in this film. And worse yet, they verbally raise the stake: "It's up to you to save the world", from what? A shameless attempt to manufacture an epic adventure. Unlike other Ghibli films, this one did not have a real lesson learned or a concrete message. Fragmented and poorly structured plot without a central theme. The story is a complete mess despite simplicity, things just happened, and characters just behaved the way they did without apparent character development. Admittedly this is a children's movie, but it should not require intelligence level of a child to be enjoyable.
The ending was the most unsatisfying one among all Ghibli film I have seen thus far. Things happened in a rapid succession, leading to a sudden jump and kiss out of the blue. It couldn't have been any more rushed than it was. The transition to the theme song was abrupt, and poor credit roll was a complete waste of an addictive theme song. This is totally inexcusable execution of the ending for what has become a mediocre anime movie. With 'Howl's Moving Castle' being a personal flop, and 'Tales of Earthsea' being a widely accepted failure, this is strike three Ghibli for me. I don't want to sound like one of those film fans who cling in the past, but they simply don't make anime movies the way they used to.
