Talk:Howl's Moving Castle (film)/Archive 1

Japanese or English Cast
The cast listings for HMC in the info-box just got changed from the original to the English-language. Does this correspond to a wikipedia standard for en.wiki? It does not appear to be the case in the other Miyazaki films. If nobody says otherwise, I'll change it back to the original Japanese cast. Deborah-jl Talk 15:31, 6 February 2006 (UTC)
 * Shouldn't we be listing both casts?--nihon 18:28, 6 February 2006 (UTC)
 * I would think so. The WikiProject Movies page doesn't give more explicit detail about what ought to go there, besides "principal actors", which in this case, I would assume be voice actors for Howl and Sophie in Japanese (because that's the original) and English (because this is the English-language wikipedia). Deborah-jl Talk 18:59, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

Release dates
The complete set of release dates is a little unwieldy. I move we replace it with the Japanese release dates and the release dates in English-speaking countries, which covers original language and the needs of en.wikipedia.org. Alternately, I'd vote for Japan only, at least in the infobox. It's too much to read right now. Deborah-jl Talk 20:03, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Hallucinogenic visuals?
Where in the film are there hallucinogenic or psychadelic visuals? I think this is an incorrect comment.
 * Probably refers to scenes like when Sophie and Howl are attached by Madame Suliman with the water, when Sophie goes thru the gateway door into the past, etc. Emb021 15 March 2006
 * I see what it refers to, but I'm not sure I like the wording. Cmouse 19:45, 15 March 2006 (UTC)
 * I also didn't see any psychedelic scenes in the movie - see Dumbo's Pink Elephants on Parade for a real psychedelic sequence in popular animation. Perhaps the word the original author was looking for was 'phantasmagorical'?  Ordinarily one could use 'surreal', but most of the movie fits that description. I'll make the substitution lest somebody get the idea that Miyazaki needs substances or fevers to invent his wonderous imagery.  I don't mean to confuse anybody with uncommon words but 'hallucinatory' is at least potentially misleading, likely insulting, and probably wrong.  Better words welcomed. BillMcGonigle 06:00, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

Any Criticism?
I know this film has been heavily criticzed, more so than Miyazaki's other works. Could anyone mention it? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 138.110.224.159 (talk • contribs).
 * Actually, it hasn't been criticized more than his other works. It's about the same. Perhaps it's more noticeable now, though, asn more of the criticism is in English. (^_^) --日本穣 Nihonjoe 16:39, 21 April 2006 (UTC)
 * I certainly shared the impression that it was a lot more heavily criticised (in the English-language press) than Spirited Away, for instance - I remember reviews at the time complaining of incoherency and more than one describing it as one of his weakest works. It seems a bit off that the Reception section of this entry barely touches on that. --Oolong (talk) 12:26, 4 March 2010 (UTC)

Plot should be from the movie, not the book
When I read the plot summary, I was suprised, because it was very different than the film. It turns out that many elements from the book were included. This is not right. Only the movie's plot should be covered here, perhaps with a later section explaining differences from the book, instead of the opposite, which is done here. Everyguy 20:54, 2 January 2007 (UTC)


 * i agree, this section is lifted directly from the plot section on the book. however as noted in the next section most of it doesn't even apply to the movie. [unsigned]
 * Exactly. The whole plot section needs a rewrite because the book has its own article.Rebochan 07:22, 7 January 2007 (UTC)
 * I agree with rebochan. after watching the movie twice, and reading the summarry here, i still don't understand some parts of the movie. i don't know much about the book, but either way, the summarry is inadequate. [unsigned]

I don't normally do these so forgive any general errors, but I was also under the impression that Sophie never broke the spell. From all I've seen and heard it seems more that the spell kept her old when she felt old and she was young when she felt young. In this sense she never broke the curse. Even if this is not true, they never mention Sophie breaking the cure in the movie to my knowledge, so saying she did would be speculation in the movie summery. I think someone needs to clean it up of things like that and wierd opinion stuff like 'dashing'. It would trim the summery too. S.R.Osuna 00:03, 28 January 2007 (UTC)

Overly long plot summary
It strikes me that the plot summary for this page is a lot longer than when I last looked at it. While it is certainly a more complete summary, I think it is now a bit too long. The current focus is more on the fictional subject matter than anything else. Unless anyone strongly objects, I'll look at pruning it slightly to make it more succinct. Dr Aaron 11:07, 28 February 2007 (UTC)


 * Alright, I've gone through and trimmed the plot summary. It is still probably too long for many people, but it is actually quite a complicated plot. I tried to take out anything not essential as well as anything that cannot be taken from the movie as a primary source.
 * I next reordered the article to make it more consistent with other film entries - i.e. story, then cast, then staff listing, awards, differences between film & book, trivia, references.
 * I moved one of the existing pictures so as to give an even distribution of illustrations and text.
 * I think this overall makes the article a bit better. At least B class I hope. Dr Aaron 09:12, 1 March 2007 (UTC)


 * It's great! This is a VERY good plot summary. It really helped me understand the story better (watching the movie only once left me with quite a few questions that this cleared up nicely). One thing I don't get, though, is that the Witch of the Waste was able to recognize the purse as a trap right away, found the black worm thingy and chucked it into the fire, but then apparently smokes the cigar thinking it harmless? This article says the cigar made Calcifer sick, but he seemed to think it was the worm.


 * The article equivocates on whether it was the bug or the cigar, saying one and then the other. I certainly don't remember anything in the film to indicate the cigar was harmful beyond being unpleasant for everyone who had to breathe it... But then, there's a lot in that plot summary that I saw no indication of in the film, and I'm not 100% sure a very careful re-watching wouldn't change my mind. Incidentally I'm still confused about why Sophie decided to get everyone out of the castle, causing it to collapse, but then went straight back in to the ruin. --Oolong (talk) 12:32, 4 March 2010 (UTC)

The witch would not have smoked the cigar had it been harmful to the household as she was trying to get rid of whatever harmful object was there in the first place. It was therefore the worm that was the cause of Calcifer going out. This is because it was thrown into him to burn. He was used throughout the film as a sort of comic relief such as when Sophie is cleaning the fire place and in general his speech displays a typical Japanese buffoon type character. His near death was therefore humorous in the film's context.

The witch could sense the bag because she is a witch and so magical powers are able to pick up or interact with magical creatures or objects. This is also shown when Sophie and Howl are in Howl's bedroom and the magical ornament begins to sparkle and turn. Howl says it's the witch of the waste trying to locate the castle. In Spirited Away by Miyazaki, Ubaba, another witch senses that gold is nothing more than mud and then it changes into its true form. The three bouncing heads do the same after Ubaba waves her finger at them. This trend suggests that Miyazaki witches have this ability.

Sophie got everyone out of the castle because the castle was still connected to the portal of the flower shop in the city that was being bombed. If the bombs hit the flower shop then the castle would also explode since they were the same place. By disconnecting the castle they were able to disconnect from the portal to the flower shop and save Calciver. Calcifer says that only Howl can disconnect the portal magically and so without him it was the only way.

This is my 2 cents. I don't know how helpful it will be. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 196.215.97.20 (talk) 14:06, 4 December 2011 (UTC)

Plot
Plot needs to be shortened. Its a plot not tell me the whole movie. That will just ruin the movie for anyone who wants to watch it and hasn't watched it. What I am keeping of the plot is an actual plot. I removing most of it and keeping this part only:

"The film starts off with the protagonist of Howl’s Moving Castle, Sophie, a timid and unsure 18-year-old girl who works in her late father's hat shop in the town of Market Chipping. While walking to meet her pretty younger sister, Lettie, at the bakery one day, Sophie has a chance encounter with the handsome but mysterious wizard Howl, who rescues her from some menacing soldiers. Howl charms her with his looks and dashing feats of magic, briefly sparking happiness in Sophie. But later that night, the vain and jealous Witch of the Waste appears in Sophie's hat shop in the form of an obese, wealthy woman, along with two of her minions. The Witch hints at a prior connection to Howl (the Witch of the Waste once came to Howl as a beautiful young woman, which there Howl pursued her as a lover, but rejected her after seeing her true form. The Witch now assails Howl with the fury of a jilted lover) and curses Sophie by transforming her into a 90-year-old woman before disappearing.

Because of her mysterious transformation and afraid that people will ask questions (not to mention the fact that the transformation spell also prevents her from telling others of her predicament), Sophie runs away from home and journeys into the Waste. There, she befriends a magically animated scarecrow whom she names Turnip Head. Turnip Head secures her shelter from the Waste within Howl’s moving castle, a chaotic ensemble that walks upon mechanical chicken legs (similar to Baba Yaga's Dancing Hut of Russian folklore)."

Cardinal Raven71.143.3.182 (talk) 15:51, 26 March 2008 (UTC)Cardinal Raven

I have finished watching the film for the second time less than five minutes ago. I believe that the plot is not too detailed. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 118.209.119.12 (talk) 06:40, 27 February 2012 (UTC)

Differences between book and movie
Seems to be speculation. For example, in the movie, Calcifer is still scary looking all the time (but mitigated by him being good). Lots42 (talk) 12:23, 31 March 2008 (UTC)

Reappearing Characters
I took out the part that said the movie had "re-appearing characters from other Miyazaki films (with differing ages, forms and roles)" because there is no citation and no evidence for this in the movie. In fact, the entire thing sentence is non-sensical because even if any of the characters happen to share certain traits in common with completely different characters from other Miyazaki films, that does not mean that they are those earlier characters reappearing in a different guise. If that were the case, then any characters from various different media that shared traits could be said to be the same character in disguise. 66.208.215.118 (talk) 03:11, 3 April 2008 (UTC)