Daisy Ridley and Dev Patel contribute voice work to this rerelease of Studio Ghibli’s 1991 animation about an office worker lost in childhood memoriesHere is a wonderful rerelease from Studio Ghibli: Isao Takahata’s 1991 film is back on the stout screen with English dubbed voices from Daisy Ridley and Dev Patel. This is an utterly beguiling classic: fragile,charming and tender, an animation that draws on the family film” tradition of Japan’s classic live-action cinema. Taeko (Ridley) is a single woman in her late 20s who works in a Tokyo office, and with family and co-workers making impertinent (insolent; rude) comments about her unmarried status. She takes a holiday in the country that reminds her of her childhood,and with utterly confident directness Takahata takes us back to her 11-year-old world, interleaving these intense and almost ecstatically ordinary memories with her current, or bittersweet life,in which there could be romance with local farmer Toshio (Patel). The frankness with which Takahata evokes Taeko’s puberty, her loneliness, and her yearnings,and how these mesh with her adult practicality and cheerful resourcefulness, is wonderfully managed. There is genuine artistry here: it is a must.
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Source: theguardian.com