In this very loose adaptation of one of Miyazaki’s favorite childhood books, the 1937 novel How Do You Live?(
Ten years after what was considered the final chapter in the legacy of Hayao Miyazaki, the now-octogenarian returned with what could be called a gorgeous epilogue. In this very loose adaptation of one of Miyazaki’s favorite childhood books, the 1937 novel How Do You Live?(which is this film’s superior title in Japan, by the way), the animator revisits images and themes from Spirited Away, Princess Mononoke, Howl’s Moving Castle, and more, but it doesn’t feel like a greatest hits so much as a summation of an essential career. More than ever before, Miyazaki includes biographical details in this telling of the story of a boy named Mahito, who loses his mother in a fire during World War II and gets shuffled off to a country home with his father and potential stepmother. There, he finds a mysterious trickster of a heron, who draws him to a nearby castle that’s a portal to an alternate fantasy universe. On a journey to save his new mother, Mahito discovers fascist parakeets, adorable creatures called warawara, and an ally who has a connection to Mahito’s past. What now looks like his final film contains some of Miyazaki’s most striking imagery, culminating in a series of scenes about creation, power, and connection that feel like they tie so many of the master’s themes together that it’s impossible not to cry at their beauty.