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On June 6, an interim report conference was held for Studio Ghibli’s newest film, The Wind is Rising, which will be released in theaters throughout Japan on July 20. The Wind is Rising has gained huge attention for being director Hayao Miyazaki’s first work in five years. The main character of the film, Jiro, is a fusion of two people who were alive during the same period: Jiro Horikoshi, the creator of the Zero Fighter plane, and author Tatsuo Hori. The only cast member who was previously announced was Hideaki Anno as the voice of Jiro. Miyazaki and Anno unexpectedly working together is also causing quite a stir.
Following the four minute special video that is only being screened in theaters beginning on June 8, the first person to appear was Toshio Suzuki, a producer at Studio Ghibli. Suzuki first explained the current state of the film’s production. What was especially surprising was the sound. Many movies are currently being produced using high quality sound like Dolby surround. However, this film is being recorded in monaural.
On this point, Suzuki said, “Since Nausicaä, we’ve gone back and listened to the sound always used in Ghibli works, but in the end, we reached the conclusion that monaural really is the best way to go.” He then announced one more shocking piece of information regarding the sound: “Several of the Zero Fighters and other sound effects are being expressed using a person’s mouth.” Though, this doesn’t include all of the sounds. Another astounding fact was that in the beginning, Miyazaki along with Suzuki both tried creating the sound effects as a test of their enthusiasm. In the end though, they were both rejected.
Up next, Suzuki introduced the voice actress playing the part of the heroine Nahoko: Miori Takimoto. Takimoto is a very active young actress who starred in NHK’s TV drama Teppan and is the face of Sony Assurance in their commercials. Suzuki talked about how happy director Miyazaki was with her ideal voice and acting ability.
Takimoto expressed her enthusiasm at that time of wanting to do her best, and, hinting that the post recording ended extremely smoothly, spoke from her heart, saying, “The post recording flew by in an instant and I thought, ‘I want to be here (Studio Ghibli) even more!’” Through Suzuki talking with Takimoto, it was revealed that, although rarely seen in a Miyazaki work, the film has a kissing scene between Jiro and Nahoko. Anno’s high praise of the film was also revealed when they discussed how after the post recording had ended, Anno said, “This last scene is splendid. This is the best work Miya (director Miyazaki) has done!”
The screened special video also included a depiction of the great Kanto earthquake of 1923. A reporter then asked, “[By depicting] things like the recession and earthquake, are any messages aimed at today’s generation being included?” When the question was posed, Suzuki prefaced his answer by explaining that the project began in August 2010, was officially greenlit for production in December of that year, and Miyazaki began working on the storyboards at the beginning of 2011. After the earthquake that hit Eastern Japan that year, there was talk about whether to change the story. However, it was decided that production would continue without any revisions. With that being said, Suzuki answered the initial question, saying, “We were thinking that If we connected too much with the current age, the original work would become something different.” Suzuki then touched on the act of hitting on the director’s thoughts through the work, saying, “This may become a work similar to Miya’s testament.”
There is no doubt that this film is one that, more than any other in Ghibli’s history, breaks into the realm of adult love and compiles together many of director Miyazaki’s own thoughts. There is about a month to go before the movie is released. Information will continue to be released successively until then, but the real joy will be seeing it in theaters. For those who can’t wait until then, the special video is now being shown in theaters throughout Japan.
The Wind is Rising Official Site:
http://kazetachinu.jp/ (Japanese)
Source:
http://animeanime.jp/article/2013/06/06/14316.html (Japanese)
Source article written by Youhei Hosokawa
