The Blackberry Walk

It has been a while since I last watched Howl’s moving castle. I enjoyed it very much – don’t get me wrong – but I often feel that after Princess Mononoke, Miyazaki’s work has declined in quality as he ages (excluding Ponyo). Howl has an almost Disney feels and despite having all the classic Miyazaki themes doesn’t feel as Miyazaki as many of his earlier works. But that’s all besides the point. Today we’ll be looking at the themes and ideas at play in Howl – specifically the idea of ‘acting your age’ and the illness that can afflict those who don’t. First, let’s look at Sophie, the hero of the tale. At the dawn of the story, Sophie works hard making hats, sacrificing herself in the process, whilst her mother goes about marrying new husbands and partying. Her youthful mother never grows up to act with the responsibility of her age and instead relies on Sophie who, in a kind of compensation, acts well beyond her years, with a great sense of duty and kindness for others. This kind of acting beyond her years is the reason why Sophie’s aging swings back and forth throughout the movie from young to old and back again. Sophie’s curse was given by the Witch of Waste – a witch who lives out her youthful fantasies (note that the witch’s magic is ‘fantastical’) despite being exceptionally old. And in living in this state of eternal youth, her elderliness has no where to manifest itself except as a projection – as a magic spell – which is inflicted vindictively upon any youth she passes. The Witch of Waste craves for youth – she wants to continue the journey’s of youth once more and to do so she needs Howl’s heart – the heart of the eternal child. Insofar as Sophie acts like an old lady, Howl acts like a child. As we later discover, Howl caught some kind of magic star piece as a child which he swallowed, producing Calcifer, his heart. In signing this Faustian pact, he externalised his soul, much like in Madoka, into a kind of soul object and in doing so obtained great powers. At what cost however. His heart will never grow beyond that of youth. His boyhood spirit has ‘calcified’ in the form of Calcifer. The eternal child, Howl, who will never lose the ‘magic’ of childhood. The child and the man inside of Howl are in civil war. The child in charge, dominating how Howl acts, like when he wails like a child at Sophie for cleaning his stuff up or when Howl asks Sophie to go to Suliman in his stead. However Howl’s body’s throne is fit for a man – and that repressed man inside of him is forever trying to retake the throne which is rightly his. We see the conflict in Howl’s depressive moods, where the world begins to melt around him into a kind of goo whenever any sign of weakness is shown in the child-like spirit since the repressed man inside of Howl senses the child’s weakness and attacks like a hound. This corrupting childhood spirit which possesses Howl enables his body to become a raven through its magic. Abusing his body by assuming raven form, is in turn an abuse of the grown man inside of him, since his body, which is the body of a man, is a reminder to the child-like spirit that the manly spirit really should be in charge. The child spirit thinks that by wrecking the body, that the child can live forever. Black birds of any kind are all signs of death whether it be the crow or the raven. They are the darkness in Howl’s heart from his inner conflict. Just like in Madoka, when you sign off your soul, it becomes your responsibility to fight the darkness which wells up. Howl uses the raven form to go off to war, but why must Howl go off to war anyway? He heads off at the behest of Suliman, the King, so he has no choice, right? Sophie teaches Howl to overcome his child-like spirit by telling him to stand up for himself against parental authority (the King here being the father of the nation) and say “no, I won’t sacrifice my body and health for this war.” Howl learns the importance of his body – to respect his body – and to act in accordance with his body, his biology and his gut instinct. He develops a kind of mutual respect and synergy wherein he is in concord with himself – a man’s soul harmonious with a man’s body, instead of the overstayed welcome of the child’s soul. In summary, Howl is the child is an adults body, whereas Sophie is an adult in a child’s body and, through their love, they hammer out each other’s dents, bringing both of them back to homeostasis. When she feels in love with the youthful Howl, Sophie’s flashes of youthfulness spring out, and at once she looks like a maiden again. Through relating to Howl, she’s realigned with who she really ought to be – a young girl – instead of her mother’s maid. And Howl, who was without parents in his youth, is told by the mother-like figure of Sophie, to grow up and get his shit together. Howl’s finally given a bit of push back in his life and is awoken from his fantastical, ‘magical’, child-like dream state. Sophie extinguishes Calcifer, his flame of boyhood, allowing Howl the man’s heart to grow instead of sitting calcified. The irony of the ending is that after being freed, Calcifer returns to Howl. What Howl is so afraid of giving up, his youthful spirit, won’t vanish by becoming a man. Memories of boyhood, feelings of boyhood, always exist in a rose-tinted nostalgia, and can be remembered and felt at whatever age. Don’t hold on to the past, but rather grow up with confidence and it will always tag along.