Skip to footer

Hayao Miyazaki: 'Spirited Away' from film but not comics

Animation director Hayao Miyazaki will be honored Saturday night with an Academy Award. 

|
(AP Photo/Koji Sasahara, File)
Hayao Miyazaki, one of animation's most admired and successful directors, speaks in 2013 on his retirement in Tokyo. The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences will present Honorary Awards to Jean-Claude Carrière, Miyazaki and Maureen O’Hara, and the Jean Hersholt Humanitarian Award to Harry Belafonte.

Fans of the animated films such as “Spirited Away” and Ponyo” who were devastated when Hayao Miyazaki announced his retirement in February can at least rejoice in the director being honored Saturday night when the International Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences presents the artist and director with its Governors Award.

“I really felt that this was the maximum that I could give to produce an animated film,” Miyazaki told Buzzfeed in February after announcing his retirement for the second time in his long career. “The work of animation is building up bricks and mortar, bricks and mortar. I felt I wouldn’t be able to put [up] another brick.”

Today’s honorary Oscar is “to honor extraordinary distinction in lifetime achievement, exceptional contributions to the state of motion picture arts and sciences, or for outstanding service to the Academy," according to the Academy's website. 

Miyazaki is an artist, writer, director, producer and three-time Oscar nominee in the Animated Feature Film category.

He won an Oscar for 'Spirited Away' (2002). 

His other Academy Award nominations include: 'Howl’s Moving Castle' (2005)  and 'The Wind Rises'  (2013).  

Miyazaki has a huge international following, particularly in his homeland, Japan.

Some of his most famous works include: 'Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind,' 'Laputa: Castle in the Sky,' 'My Neighbor Totoro,' and 'Kiki’s Delivery Service,' and the mega international sensation 'Princess Mononoke' in the late 1990s.  

He is the co-founder of Studio Ghibli, a renowned animation studio based in Tokyo. 

Honorary awards are also being presented to Novelist Jean-Claude Carrière and Actress Maureen O’Hara, known for her roles in 'The Quiet Man' co-starring John Wayne  and 'Miracle on 34th Street.'  

The Jean Hersholt Humanitarian Award goes to Singer Harry Belafonte for his long fight against injustice, racial and otherwise. Initially known for his Calypso music in the 1950s and 60s, Mr. Belafonte became known for fighting against the “Black List” of the McCarthy Era and for human rights.

Also according to Buzzfeed, Miyazaki says that for him retirement from film making means keeping his hand in by working on “exhibition projects and short films” for the Ghibli Museum.

This may also be a boon for comic book fans since the artist intends to return to drawing a manga comics.

You've read  of  free articles. Subscribe to continue.
Real news can be honest, hopeful, credible, constructive.
What is the Monitor difference? Tackling the tough headlines – with humanity. Listening to sources – with respect. Seeing the story that others are missing by reporting what so often gets overlooked: the values that connect us. That’s Monitor reporting – news that changes how you see the world.
editor@csmonitor.com
Subscribe
Mark Sappenfield
Editor

Dear Reader,

About a year ago, I happened upon this statement about the Monitor in the Harvard Business Review – under the charming heading of “do things that don’t interest you”:

“Many things that end up” being meaningful, writes social scientist Joseph Grenny, “have come from conference workshops, articles, or online videos that began as a chore and ended with an insight. My work in Kenya, for example, was heavily influenced by a Christian Science Monitor article I had forced myself to read 10 years earlier. Sometimes, we call things ‘boring’ simply because they lie outside the box we are currently in.”

If you were to come up with a punchline to a joke about the Monitor, that would probably be it. We’re seen as being global, fair, insightful, and perhaps a bit too earnest. We’re the bran muffin of journalism.

But you know what? We change lives. And I’m going to argue that we change lives precisely because we force open that too-small box that most human beings think they live in.

The Monitor is a peculiar little publication that’s hard for the world to figure out. We’re run by a church, but we’re not only for church members and we’re not about converting people. We’re known as being fair even as the world becomes as polarized as at any time since the newspaper’s founding in 1908.

We have a mission beyond circulation, we want to bridge divides. We’re about kicking down the door of thought everywhere and saying, “You are bigger and more capable than you realize. And we can prove it.”

If you’re looking for bran muffin journalism, you can subscribe to the Monitor for $15. You’ll get the Monitor Weekly magazine, the Monitor Daily email, and unlimited access to CSMonitor.com.

Subscribe to insightful journalism

QR Code to Hayao Miyazaki: 'Spirited Away' from film but not comics
Read this article in
https://www.csmonitor.com/The-Culture/Culture-Cafe/2014/1108/Hayao-Miyazaki-Spirited-Away-from-film-but-not-comics
QR Code to Subscription page
Start your subscription today
https://www.csmonitor.com/subscribe