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movie review - The Secret World of Arriety

the journal of Michael Werneburg

twenty-seven years and one million words

This is an animated movie from Japan's Ghibli studio. It's about a family of tiny people that live in the small spaces of a human household. Times are not good for the tiny folk; they no longer know of any neighboring families of their kind, and their own household is just three people. The teenage daughter wants more from life than to live in the shadows, and it's that that drives the movie along as the whole family is soon exposed. What follows is a tale of hardship for the family and struggle to survive the potential exposure of their entire race.

This has its rough patches, primarily I think in the way it was translated, but I enjoyed the story, the animation and sets, the themes of loneliness and the need for contact, and the satisfying ending.

Recommended.