借りぐらしのアリエッティ

I've been dying to see the new Ghibli anime The Secret World of Arrietty, since the shorts were released and finally did last night at the Luna outdoor cinemas. The film follows the adventures of Arrietty, a thirteen year old ten centimeter tall girl and her equally as small family, known as the Borrowers. Arrietty meets a human 'bean' (a rather funny translation error that occurred throughout the film) called Sho, who despite all her warning from her parents that human beans are dangerous creatures, befriends him. The animation, like always, was quite amazing and intricate. The exploration of the world of the Borrowers was made real by Hiromasa Yonebayashi's attention to the tiniest of details, most noticeably the single drops of water filling the mugs of the borrowers which really allowed the viewer to connect with the magnitude of the situation and the diminutive world of Arrietty. The set design of the films was incredible, with ticking clocks reverberating through the floorboards and outdoor landscapes all finished off with the precision of a static illustration. Despite some accusations of a banal conclusion, I thought the film still preserved the fragile imagination of a childs mind, and for the older viewers, a sense of nostalgia of Ghibli's other films such as Spirited Away and My Neighbor Totoro.