Worst Studio Ghibli Feature?

T

The-Cool-Geek

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Inspired by the Pixar thread in the Disney forum. Which Studio Ghibli film would you say is your least favorite?

Of all the ones I've seen, Pom Poko is certainly the most dissapointing. I liked the premise, but the movie never seemed able to decide what it wanted to be, and it's lack of a protaganist was also grating.
 
Hard to say. Howl's Moving Castle is often a victim of this, but I have to jump on the bandwagon and possibly declare this one of the "worst" of his films. Not bad by any stretch, but sometime after Sophie visits the King's Witch (Saurmon or some such), the plot becomes tangled and convoluted. What was once straightforward kinda gets lost amongst all the war, time traveling, and abstract...whatevers. I like syrabolism and uniqueness as much as the next guy, but not when its this muddled.
 
The ending to Howl's made me so confused and angry.

The war-hungry witch just goes "Oh, hugs and kisses. Totally forget that big, bad war we did to start this whole crap."

They don't even address the horror of permanently transfigured humans-into-birRAB or the effects of the war itself other than "OH yeah, war-hey, is that a field?! Let's go run around in it!"
 
Yeah, Howl's had problems, but Tales from Earthsea was AWFUL. The characters are annoying and the plot is so generic, apparently the creative gene was not passed down.
 
I thought Earthsea was still in production! How long has it been out in Japan?


Of all the Ghibli films I've seen, Only Yesterday is the only one I couldn't stand. It was so freaking dull! There was no real conflict or plot. Just some office lady having random flasrabroadacks to her childhood.
And it doesn't help that Only Yesterday is one of those movies that's very hard to enjoy if you don't understand all the Japanese pop culture references.
 
Hey I liked Gedo Senki people. =\

If anything I would say Pom Poko, which was for the majority part highly boring, disjointed, and focused far too much on set pieces and mockumentaries, and Laputa, which not only did not have much for an enjoyable Japanese dub, but an atrocious English dub where EVERYBODY is talking. They can't even last five seconRAB without having to rabble on about something.
 
Oh I love the English Laputa dub. I mean, it's not perfect by any means, and it DOES feel too talky, but - and this probably has a lot to do with my preference of dub to sub - I watch it just as often as the Japanese. And it's probably my favorite Ghibli film (well, right behind Porco Rosso) on top of that.

I've never been a big fan of Spirited Away, honestly - not that it's bad, just that it's not very high on my list. Howl's Moving Castle, too; not the best I've seen. But I can't really call any of them "the worst," because none of them are bad. From what I've seen of them, EVERY Ghibli film is a quality one.
 
All the Hayao Miyazaki ones, at least.

I haven't seen Pom Poko, but it doesn't sound too good (preachiness and testicles? ugh), and Tales from Earthsea is supposedly so awful it beat The Da Vinci Code and Lady in the Water at the Japanese Razzies.
 
I picked Grave of the Fireflies. Not because its a bad film, but because of the emotional rape you go through in the film, Seriously, they double featured THAT with Totoro?!

O-chan
 
I thought about putting Pom Poko up as a tie with Only Yesterday. But since the version of Pom Poko I saw had godawful Hong Kong subtitles; I don't think I'm fully qualified to pass judgment on it.

But judging from the parts I did understand....yeah, it was preachy as hell. The raccoons act like jackasses throughout the movie. But then the audience is supposed to feel bad when their home is threatened by the ignorant humans.
Personally, I was rooting for the greedy humans simply because they wore pants.
 
Earthsea can not be released in North America yet, due to Syfy still holding the rights after their (awful) live-action series based on the same books. They're expiring soon, though, and the shows been released in the UK. I've heard a lot of bad things.



Oh yeah, that was one of the most confusing bits of the film. Were they referenceing Japanese mythology or making a balls joke? I could'nt tell.



I pretty much agree with this one. Howl's was probably Miyazaki's worst film, though I still think it's better than... well, most other stuff.
 
Well, the whole war plot is something Miyazaki added; it's not in the book. There is a conflict, but not on that scale.

From what I know, the "pouch" is a prominent part of the Tanuki mythology, much like how Zeus sleeping with every woman he could is part of the Greek mythos.
All the hate for Howl... I like it more than some of the others. Are we blaming Miyazaki for making a bad movie or should we blame Wynne-Jones for writing a bad book? Sure, he added and subtracted parts, but over all I think it was a good adaptation.

I'm voting for Castle in the Sky, simply because it's the least liked of the ones I've seen. I still like it, though. I haven't seen all of Isao Takahata's
films, so I won't pick one of those.
 
I'm surprised that Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind isn't on this poll. If you've read the manga version of it like I have you'll see how much the movie pales in comparison.
 
Yeah, but the way they have the characters reacting to it leaves me confused.



Nausicaa was actually a pre-Ghibli Miyazaki feature. (I also actually liked the film; whether it "pales in comparison" or not I am not qualified to comment on, but that does'nt make it bad by default)
 
Kiki's Delivery Service.

I liked the movie and it was the first Studio Gibli film I've ever seen, but compared to Porco Rosso, Spirited Away and others that I've seen I have to give it the nod as my least favorite.
 
It just goes to prove that childhood doesn't last forever and that we will have to face harsh reality sooner or later. That's why I think those movies were paired together in Japan.

There's a Japanese Razzies?

EPIC WIN!!! Thanks for the clip.
 
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