Movie Thoughts: Pom Poko (1994)

• Released: 25 December 1994
• Directed by: Isao Takahata 
• Running time: 1 h 59 min
• Rating 1.5/5

Synopsis

A clan of tanukis tries to function in a modern society occupied nearly everywhere by humans.

My Thoughts

Probably my least favorite Ghibli film that I've seen so far. I'm not a big fan of their other works, either, but this one really wasn't for me.

It has a notably more comedic tone than most Ghibli films I've seen, but one of the counterpoints to that is that it isn't funny. I didn't crack a smile once during this. Also, yes, a lot of characters do die in this and it's often not given the right tone.

The story is needlessly dragged out, this felt like five hours, not two. It's also very unfocused. We have so damn many characters and not one clear protagonist. The character designs are also not very distinct, so I often had trouble who was who when they were in their cartoon tanuki form. I seriously couldn't remember any of the character's names because there are so damn many of them and not one of them gets a central focus. I also didn't like a lot of the characters.

The environmental message is also way too on-the-nose. We literally have one of the characters directly address the audience at the end to say how we need to treat nature better & shit as if this is Dora the Explorer.

The animation was spectacular as always, but that wasn't enough to save it for me.

Also a lot of things didn't make sense to me but that's just because I'm white and have no cultural context for it.