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Home , Jiro Horikoshi, The Wind Rises

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The Wind Rises: A Swirling Controversy

Sean Mowry ‘16 HST 401: World War II in Cinema Professor Alan Allport

In the summer of 2013, Japanese recent history, and its messages are director released his final important to examine. This is especially the movie as a writer and director, The Wind case in the current context of Japanese Rises.55 Miyazaki is a legend in Japanese desires to remilitarize under its cinema, and is often referred to as the “Walt conservative leadership. 56 Disney of .” He is a founder, and the tells the story of Jiro most famous member of the -based Horikoshi, the real life designer of the animation studio, , which has A6M Zero fighter plane, the produced 5 of the 15 highest grossing most famous airplane in Japanese history 57 movies in Japanese history. In fact, and an icon of the Pacific War. The film The Wind Rises takes the tenth spot on that begins in Jiro’s childhood dreams as he list, and it also is the highest grossing flies acrobatically in a plane, but above him 58 Japanese film from 2013. This makes the he sees dark clouds hiding aircraft all influence of this movie very prominent in marked with the Nazi Iron Cross. Jiro’s

55 Roy Akagawa, “Excerpts of Hayao Miyazaki’s 57 “Top Grossing Anime,”Box Office Mojo, News Conference Announcing His Retirement,” Accessed December 16, 2015 , September 6, 2013 http://www.boxofficemojo.com/genres/chart/?id=a http://ajw.asahi.com/article/behind_news/people/A nime.htm J201309060087. 58 “Miyazaki’s ‘The Wind Rises’ Top Earning Film 56 Tim Morrison, “Hayao Miyazaki: In an Era of in Japan 2013”, Japan Today, 01/13/14, High-Tech Wizardry, the Animé Auteur Makes http://www.japantoday.com/category/entertainment Magic the Old Way,” Time Magazine Asia, 2006. /view/miyazakis-the-wind-rises-top-earning-film- in-japan-in-2013 17 childhood is spent longing to be a pilot but want to allow her to stay because they are he is prevented because of his unmarried, so they marry then and there nearsightedness. In another dream he is despite Naoko’s grim health. Jiro continues told by the famous Italian airplane designer, to work, and he successfully tests his new Giovanni Battista Caproni, that designing plane, the , the first planes is better than flying them. He monoplane shipboard fighter and the follows Caproni’s advice and 5 years later, predecessor for the A6M Zero. Despite the when travelling by train to study at success of the test, and his cheering University in Tokyo, the Great Kanto coworkers, Jiro feels the wind change and Earthquake of 1923 strikes the city and he he runs home fearing that something is reunites a lost young girl Naoko with her wrong with Naoko. When he returns he family. After graduating with his friend and finds letters left by her before she returned future designer Kiro Honjo, they both work to the mountains, and shortly after she dies. for Mitsubishi to design planes for the The film ends right after Japan loses the war military. Frustrated with the lagging and is left devastated by air raids. Jiro Japanese technology, Jiro and Kiro are sent dreams again of meeting Caproni and to Germany and meet famed designer Hugo confesses that he regrets that his planes Junkers who is kind to them while his Nazi were used for war but Caproni comforts subordinates refuse to help. him by saying that at least his beautiful After returning to Japan, Jiro is dream was realized. Naoko makes a final promoted to chief designer and he builds appearance to tell Jiro to move on from her the Mitsubishi 1MF10, which fails in the death, and live life to the fullest. prototype stage. To recover from his When The Wind Rises was released, disappointment, Jiro goes to a summer it was met with massive commercial resort where he runs into Naoko, the girl he success and critical acclaim. It was the helped during the Great Kanto Earthquake. highest grossing film in Japan in 2013, They become engaged, but she refuses to receiving $110 million. 59 Critically, the marry him until she recovers from film was praised universally, especially in . A German guest at the resort, America and Europe, earning an 83 on Castorp, who is critical of the Nazis assists Metacritic, an aggregator that averages out in their relationship but is eventually chased all of the available reviews from established out by the Japanese secret police. The film critics on the Internet. Scoring over an police’s eyes turn to Jiro due to his relation 80 categorizes the film as having “universal with Castorp, so he must leave and take up acclaim.”60 The film was so popular in the residence at his supervisor’s home in order United States it was even nominated for to work on a new project. While there, he Best Animated Feature by the Academy is informed that Naoko suffered a lung Awards. 61 This praise was not all hemorrhage and is recovering up in the international, as the Asia-Pacific Journal mountains, but she cannot bear being away called it “one of Miyazaki’s most ambitious from him so she lives with him at his and thought-provoking visions.” 62 supervisor’s house. His supervisor does not However, thought provoking might be the

59 Kevin Ma, “The Wind Rises Tops 2013 Japan 61 “2013 Nominations and B.O.,” Film Business Asia, January 1, 2014 , Winners by Category,” Box Office Mojo, Accessed http://www.filmbiz.asia/news/the-wind-rises-tops- December 16, 2015 2013-japan-bo http://www.boxofficemojo.com/oscar/chart/?view= 60 “The Wind Rises,” Metacritic, Accessed allcategories&yr=2013&p=.htm. December 16, 2015 62 Matthew Penne, “Miyazaki Hayao’s Kaze http://www.metacritic.com/movie/the-wind-rises. Tachinu (The Wind Rises),” The Asia-Pacific Journal: Japan Focus, August 5, 2013

17 18 most key part of this review, because the pacifist whose father earned his income film stirred up plenty of controversy as during the war working for a fighter parts well. In South Korea, activists “accused the manufacturer, and a committed artist who director…of lionizing the creator of one of also tried to appreciate the realities of the most potent symbols of Japanese life.”66 So this final film can be understood militarism, and pointed out that among the as a heavily conflicted and tragic personal workers who assembled more than 10,000 reflection. However, despite its intentions of the state-of-the-art fighters were forced as a film it became part of the political laborers from the Korean peninsula.”63 In dialogue after it was released. Politically, addition, “Japanese Miyazaki addressed his in Studio nationalists…denounce[d] Miyazaki…as a Ghibli’s “July issue of Neppu, Ghibli’s free ‘traitor’ and ‘anti-Japanese’ for the film’s self-publicized monthly booklet.” 67 This focus on the futility of war.”64 If his film is booklet “featured a special section on Prime attracting criticism from both sides of the Minister Shinzo Abe and his political spectrum, those fearful of a administration’s campaign to revise militarized Japan, and those in favor of it, Japan’s pacifist Constitution. Miyazaki then it must be worth asking what makes declared his unequivocal opposition to this film so divisive. Is the film an anti-war revising the war renouncing Article 9.”68 film, or is it a pro-war film? There can also Article 9 of the Japanese Constitution be another option, because The Wind Rises states, “Aspiring sincerely to an is superficially incapable of simple international peace based on justice and categorization and in that case a more order, the Japanese people forever renounce nuanced label must be applied. To war as a sovereign right of the nation and understand what position The Wind Rises the threat or use of force as means of takes on World War 2, it can be useful to settling international disputes. In order to first understand the intentions of Miyazaki accomplish the aim of the preceding himself. paragraph, land, sea, and air forces, as well It is interesting why Miyazaki chose as other war potential, will never be to end his career on such a controversial maintained. The right of belligerency of the 69 movie but he explains, “He was drawn to state will not be recognized.” When The Horikoshi’s alleged statement that ‘All I Wind Rises was released in 2013, Shinzo wanted to do was to make something Abe, Japan’s Prime Minister had been beautiful’.”65 This reflects Miyazaki’s own pushing to amend Japan’s Constitution to 70 inner contradictions because “Miyazaki is a allow for “collective self-defense.” This http://japanfocus.org/-Matthew- 67 Roland Kelts, “Backlash Against Miyazaki is Penney/3976/article.html Generational,” Accessed 63 Justin McCurry, “Japanese Animator under Fire December 16, 2015, for Film Tribute to Warplane Designer,”, The http://www.japantimes.co.jp/culture/2013/10/08/ge Guardian August 22, 2013 neral/backlash-against-miyazaki-is- http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/aug/23/ha generational/#.VnIXkd-rSu4. yao-miyazaki-film-wind-rises. 68Ibid. 64Ibid. 69 “The ”, The Prime Minister 65 Sam Byford, “‘The Wind Rises’: The Beauty and of Japan and His Cabinet, Accessed December 16, Controversy of Miyazaki’s Final Film,” The Verge, 2015, January 23, 2014 http://japan.kantei.go.jp/constitution_and_governm http://www.theverge.com/2014/1/23/5337826/the- ent_of_japan/constitution_e.html. wind-rises-the-beauty-and-controversy-of- 70 Jeremy A. Yellen, “Shinzo Abe’s Constitutional miyazakis-final-film. Ambitions,” The Diplomat, June 12, 2014 66 Ibid. http://thediplomat.com/2014/06/shinzo-abes- constitutional-ambitions/.

18 19 would allow Japan to rebuild its military called for the Japanese government to and use it if their allies were attacked, “apologize for the so-called comfort which was seen as a stepping-stone to a women, the Imperial army’s corps use of more militarized Japan. In Neppu, wartime sex slaves that remains a highly Miyazaki wrote, “It goes without saying sensitive matter, especially between Japan that I am against constitutional reform.”71 and South Korea.”76 While Miyazaki and This was not a surprise to the Japanese his political allies face a bold nationalistic public because Miyazaki was known for his movement that holds a political majority “history of leftist postwar positions.” 72 with the Liberal Democratic Party, he is Thus, Miyazaki’s intention when writing also fighting another depiction of the Zero the film as a personal tragedy was now in a competing film. irrelevant, much like Jiro’s intentions for The Wind Rises stands in sharp designing the Zero. Miyazaki now was contrast to the Japanese War film Eternal fighting to promote pacifism in Japan and Zero. Released in the winter of 2013, to stand against Abe’s militaristic Eternal Zero was a live action film about a government and to remind his audience of boy searching for the truth about his the tragedy of World War 2, despite his grandfather, a great Zero fighter pilot who film’s contradictory, and ambivalent died executing a kamikaze mission. The narrative. film was written by Naoki Hyakuta who Miyazaki’s goal of reminding the “has publicly denied the 1937 Rape of Japanese of their shameful role in World Nanking really took place.”77 Eternal Zero War 2 and to promote pacifism in Japanese exalts the skill and courage of the Zero foreign policy is very controversial in fighter pilots and glorifies Japanese Japan. “Japan has not been as repentant as military power during World War 2. The Germany” for the atrocities they carried out Wind Rises does not have battle scenes and during World War 2, and their apologies does not discuss how Japan waged the war. have “often been undercut by revisionist It is focused less on war and more on the statements from senior politicians.” 73 To individual. Eternal Zero, however, honors make the situation worse, “Japan has Japanese sacrifices during the Pacific War. offered relatively little compensation to the The protagonist Kentaro Oishi is a failed victims. And to this day there are no law student who becomes obsessed with nationally sponsored museums or learning the story of his grandfather, Kyuzo monuments that acknowledge Japanese Miyabe, a kamikaze pilot. At first he is told aggression or atrocities.”74 This is an insult about how cowardly his father was, but then to China, who became victims of the he discovers that his father was always the brutality of the Japanese military in events first to leave the battles because his main like the Nanjing Massacre, which resulted goal was to get home safely to his wife and in the deaths of “200,000-300,000” Chinese young child. However, after a fellow pilot civilians. 75 In Neppu, Miyazaki has also Kenichiro saves him during a dogfight,

71 McCurry. 76 Kelts. 72 Kelts. 77 “Conservative Firebrand Hyakuta Sticks to His 73 Kirk Spencer, “Why Japan Is Still Not Sorry Guns, Hardens Stance Against Okinawa, Other Enough,” Time, December 11, 2012 Newspapers,” Japan Times, June 29, 2015 http://nation.time.com/2012/12/11/why-japan-is http://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2015/06/29/nati still-not-sorry-enough/. onal/conservative-firebrand-hyakuta-sticks-guns- hardens-stance-okinawa-newspapers/#.VnIakd- 74 Ibid. rSu4. 75 “Nanjing Massacre,” History, Accessed December 16, 2015 http://www.history.com/topics/nanjing-massacre.

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Miyabe makes him promise that if he dies notion that it is noble to sacrifice Kenichiro must take care of his wife and themselves for Japan. While it does child. Before Miyabe and Kenichiro go off criticize the government of Japan during on their assigned kamikaze mission, World War 2, Miyabe goes on the kamikaze Miyabe notices that his plane is having mission because he is loyal to his friend and engine trouble and decides to switch planes he wanted to repay him for saving his life. with Kenichiro so he can repay his debt to Miyabe also develops sympathy for his him. Kenichiro crash lands en route and fellow soldiers so his sacrifice is not only a lives through the end of the war. He keeps personal one but one for the people of his promise to Miyabe and takes care of his Japan, including his wife and young wife and child and he eventually becomes daughter. Kentaro Oishi’s step-grandfather. The directors of The Wind Rises and The message of the film is loyalty to Eternal Zero are fiercely at odds due to the country and comrades, because even debate over the constitutional amendment. though Miyabe is initially hesitant to fight Thus, the next question to answer is does and die for Japan, he becomes willing to die The Wind Rises successfully communicate for the man who saves his life, and that man the political position of its director, despite then saves the lives of Miyabe’s wife and the protagonist being the designer of an daughter. Japan’s Prime Minister Shinzo infamous war machine, the fictionalization Abe “declared himself ‘moved’ by the film. of his life, and the original intention of the Naoki Hyakuta, the author of the best- film as a personal reflection on a selling novel on which it is based, is close contradictory life? In order to answer this to Prime Minister Abe. Last year, the Prime question it is important to first consider the Minister chose Hyakuta to serve as a expectations of a Japanese audience when governor of NHK, the public watching a movie about their role in World broadcaster.”78 While this is disturbing to War 2. The themes and characters in these many pacifists in Japan, Eternal Zero has movies might have been used as models succeeded at the box office earning “$84.5 when writing The Wind Rises and the best million.” 79 Miyazaki has publically place to start would be the Japanese classic, denounced the film by saying “they’re The Burmese Harp. The Burmese Harp trying to make a Zero fighter movie based tells the story of Japanese soldiers on a fictional war account that is just a pack retreating through Burma in 1945. The of lies.”80 This is quite interesting because soldiers sing to keep their spirits up and are The Wind Rises is actually a fictional accompanied by a harp player, Mizushima. account of ’s life but if that He is injured while the British capture his fact is ignored it is evident what point he is group and he recovers with the help of a trying to make. While Eternal Zero might Monk, who he later impersonates to avoid be a dramatic movie about a boy trying to his own capture. Along the way to finding connect with his grandfather, the film’s his group, Mizushima buries the fallen exciting battle scenes and eventual Japanese soldiers, and by the end of the kamikaze mission might lead viewers to the movie when the soldiers escape the camp,

78 “Japan’s Right Wing, Mission Accomplished?,” http://variety.com/2014/film/asia/frozen-outlasts- The Economist, March 1, 2014 eternal-at-japan-box-office-1201157455/. http://www.economist.com/news/asia/21597946- 80 Mark Schilling, “Debate Still Rages Over Abe- film-about-kamikaze-pilots-gives-worrying-boost- Endorsed WW2 Drama,” The Japan Times nationalists-mission-accomplished. Accessed December 16, 2015 79 Mark Schilling, “‘Frozen’ Outlasts ‘Eternal’ at http://www.japantimes.co.jp/culture/2014/02/20/fil Japan Box Office,” Variety, 04/15/14, ms/debate-still-rages-over-abe-endorsed-wwii- drama/#.VnIbtN-rSu4.

20 21 he informs them that he cannot go back film quite contradictory and ambivalent. with them until he buries the bodies of all As engineers they work for Mitsubishi, of the fallen Japanese. This film was so which has contracts with the Imperial popular because “the lack of graphic Military. Because of this they keep making violence and the antiwar message [made] it and designing airplanes for them because suitable for family viewing… [and] the those were the circumstances they were avoidance of discussions of war handed down rather than finding some way responsibility.” 81 By not analyzing the of resisting the war, which would depict origin of the conflict, and only depicting the Miyazaki’s own pacifism. Rather, the film conflict itself, it is easier to digest the movie is sympathizing with the civilian Japanese for entertainment because the Japanese who couldn’t even imagine leaving Japan audience is less likely to feel guilty for the much like most of the parents and colonial ambitions of the empire. “The grandparents of the audience, which would soldiers are presented as cultured men and make the film more palatable for the they do not pillage, but ask the villagers Japanese. Like The Burmese Harp, there politely for food… [and] in one are no combat scenes; rather the war is scene…when they realize they are animated in a style that suggests it to be surrounded by the British…rather than get more of a natural storm than something into a firefight, the British and Japanese caused by human hands. During the film’s join together in a rendition of ‘Home Sweet dream sequences, especially at the Home’, which sentimentally portrays beginning and the end, war is made to look soldiers on both sides as men who simply natural with the German airships want to go home.” 82 This appeals to the resembling little parasites cloaked in storm human nature of the audience and doesn’t clouds. The Zeros fly up into the sky to join divide them with a political stance, which others in what looks like a migration of helped the film become so popular. white birds. However, both of these fleets In the case of The Wind Rises, it was are intended for war despite the fact that the a box office and critical success despite its German fleet is black while the Zeros are mixed messages, but it is similar to The white. The reason this movie might be so Burmese Harp because it avoids blaming commercially appealing is because it Japan for the war. Most of the blame is put visually shifts blame from the Japanese to on the Germans, who are depicted as the Germans, which makes it easier to manipulating the Japanese and withholding digest. information from them. In the opening In mainstream Japanese World War dream sequence, Jiro’s flying is brought to 2 films, the protagonist is often an ordinary an end when he sees the aircraft of person that is the victim of the war’s Germany who are bombing him and Japan. circumstances and who struggles to survive Although the film does not depict soldiers the tragedy of the war. A classic antiwar in combat with desires to go home, the film example of this is Twenty-Four Eyes, a film depicts all of the characters as sharing one about a teacher and the experiences of her common goal to make the best aircraft twelve pupils during the war. The tragedies possible as they wait for the war to end. of this movie are continuous, “the teacher’s However what fails to ever be addressed is husband is killed in battle and her young that the technological ambition of the daughter dies; her male pupils go to the war characters is directly contributing to the and are killed or maimed; one of the girls prolonging of the war. This actually makes dies of disease and malnutrition, while the characters, and thus the message of the another is forced into poverty and

81 Philip A. Seaton, Japan's Contested War 82 Ibid. Memories (New York: Routledge, 2007), 157.

21 22 prostitution. Nevertheless, the bond of the crew when they ridicule a between teacher and pupils survives, and at crewmember whose mother is American. the end of the drama there is a nostalgic Even though this film depicts dangerous reunion in which they remember the old combat from the war and its message is times and find hope in the future.”83 The more militaristic because it praises sacrifice film shows how the war victimized many and loyalty, “the drama takes an ‘antiwar’ Japanese civilians while not focusing on the stance against the militarists in the crew, political causes of the war. The film is and presents a message of peace based on pacifistic and anti-responsibility because it the tragic deaths of sailors who just wanted dramatizes the horrible costs of World War to be reunited with their families.” 85 2 but the film is not ashamed of Japan’s role Battleship Yamato is similar to Eternal in the conflict. Twenty-Four Eyes, like The Zero because the crewmembers might Burmese Harp, does not depict acts of disagree about the politics of the empire but violence. It only demonstrates the social they are all motivated by loyalty and duty, consequences of war. The film focuses on just like how Miyabe and his team are individuals trapped in a crumbling empire, motivated by fighting courageously and for whether they are fighting abroad or at the sake of their fellow soldiers. So despite home, and uses the power of cinema so that their verbal disagreement with war and we are able to sympathize with those we see empire, the crew of the Yamato is in reality onscreen. The audience relates to them and the aspect of the movie that relieves the their difficult circumstance and sees that Japanese of war responsibility because they war is horrible and traps all who are within are acting within the orders of their it. These people are ordinary and even if superiors. These men are soldiers and due they were against the war, what were they to their presence on the battlefield it is to do? They would have to reject their harder for them to defect from Japan government, their culture, and their friends because the American Military is actively and families if they took that stance. These trying to kill them. Also, the strong films try to depict that Japanese civilians Japanese culture of loyalty would make it could not mount any substantial rebellion near impossible for an officer to defect and that would alter the outcome of the war. make any realistic change to the mission Where the pacifist depiction wants because the rest of the crew, especially the to portray ordinary citizens or soldiers more nationalistic members, would stop wanting to return home, a militaristic them. example of this same antiwar model would The Wind Rises definitely falls into be Battleship Yamato, a film about the both the pacifist and the militaristic patterns battleship’s final kamikaze mission in of these World War 2 films because Jiro is 1945. This film is evidently more a civilian victim of the wartime conditions militaristic because it depicts combat and and he is also helping the military through the “‘survivor’s guilt’ of the officers who his aircraft designs. This is mostly due to beg the captain to go down with the ship.”84 Jiro’s circumstance as a character. In These men are so deeply invested in their Twenty-Four Eyes, “the selflessly duties that they are willing to die even dedicated teacher preempts postwar though they are not simplistic mouthpieces pacifism by cautioning her boys against for the Japanese Empire. The protagonist is volunteering for the war, for which she is Yoshioka who is a kind officer who stands reprimanded. The bravery of the characters up against the more nationalistic members in the face of adversity accentuates the pity

83 Seaton, 163. 85 Ibid, 164. 84Ibid, 164.

22 23 of war.”86 Jiro, however, does not stand up could dedicate his skills to making to the Japanese government; in fact he is passenger airplanes. This makes Caproni a contributing to their war efforts. This mixed questionable role model for a young Jiro message confuses the audience because because it makes it easier for Jiro to justify while he says how the war is foolish and he his work for the Imperial Navy because he would rather build passenger planes, his is following in the footsteps of his idol. If dreams of building the best fighter plane the plot of the movie is fictionalized, then allows Japan to use it for combat. Like the perhaps Miyazaki, if he had the foresight to teacher in Twenty-Four Eyes, Jiro does know how his film would be politicized voice his dissenting opinion during a after its release, could have taken some meeting when his team is trying to find a license with the figments of Jiro’s way of making the fighters lighter. Jiro imagination and these scenes could have suggests that “one solution could be, we been expressed with more guilt and remove all the guns” and the whole room devastation. They could have really bursts in laughter. 87 But where this differs weighed the consequences of Jiro’s from the teacher’s defiance is that she is ambitions and perhaps Jiro could have been punished while Jiro’s comment is taken as placed in a nightmare after he designs the a joke, and because of this his grievances Zero in order to communicate to the are given less weight than the teacher’s. audience that sometimes a person’s biggest What makes Jiro’s support of Japan’s dreams can turn out to be their worst military so interesting is that he is only nightmare. However none of this is shown, doing it for selfish reasons, which and worse off, all of the dream landscapes simultaneously undercuts the potential are on calm water or grassy fields and the militaristic and pacifistic messages of the battlefields and the carnage of war are film. Thus, the message of The Wind Rises never depicted. Artistically, this is perfect is more nuanced than just militaristic and because Miyazaki is able to depict this pacifistic, which reflect Miyazaki’s distance between the war and the designers intentions when making the film, but not his to show how it could be so easy to political intentions. This contradiction is contribute to the armament of regimes they beautifully reflected in the film because Jiro don’t agree with. However, it fails to and his team just want to design a great effectively communicate any other fighter but on a larger scale Jiro, like emotions besides wonder and Miyazaki, is against Japan’s militarization. accomplishment because all of the regret is An interesting aspect in The Wind just verbalized while the dream of flight is Rises is Jiro’s relationship to the other animated. characters from the tripartite countries, To Miyazaki’s credit, these dream most notably Caproni. Caproni insists that sequences with Caproni do not entirely Jiro become a designer of airplanes in the detract from his political motivations, but beginning of the film, but Caproni was a any ground gained is soon lost. When Jiro merchant of death during World War 1 returns to his dreams, the fields are green because he designed bombardment but some broken fuselages dot the airplanes for the Italian air force.88 Caproni landscape. When Jiro greets Caproni he seems to be justifying his own involvement says, “I remember this place, this is where in the war by telling Jiro to follow his we first met,” which indicates that his dreams, and he shows that after the war Jiro dream has come full circle. Caproni

86 Ibid, 163. 88“John Caproni,” Torinoscienza, Accessed 87 The Wind Rises, Directed by Hayao Miyazaki December 16, 2015, (2013; Tokyo, Japan: Studio Ghibli/ ), DVD. http://www.torinoscienza.it/personaggi/giovanni_c aproni_19858.html.

23 24 actually calls this place “our kingdom of up,” which addresses not only airplanes but dreams.” Jiro replies, “Now it’s the land of also Jiro’s ambition to make them as the dead.” This sentence makes it evident manifested in the dream they inhabit.89 But that Jiro is battling guilt regarding his in The Wind Rises, far more emphasis is contributions to the war but what is lacking given to the beauty while the curse is only is a physical, inescapable scene for this to inferred. In the movie’s environment, manifest. But because they move beyond World War 2 and Japan’s role in it was just the bone yard of planes Caproni is able to something tragic in nature like an retort, “Not quite, but in some ways yes. earthquake. But what about your ten years in the sun? Caproni’s influence on Jiro is that Did you live them well?” This is a he is making him more ambivalent towards dismissal of guilt by Caproni and a war and suffering because history is taken refocusing on Jiro’s individual story rather as unimaginable to change, despite Caproni than a true examination of his role in the only visiting Jiro in his imagination. In the war. Jiro answers, “Yes. Things fell apart middle of the film, before Jiro creates the in the end though” which acknowledges the A6M Zero, Caproni visits him in a dream to terrible aftermath of the war and the death show off his new bomber. Caproni of his love, Naoko. Caproni’s response of proposes the question, “Which will you “that’s what happens when you lose a war”, chose, a world with pyramids, or without?” while personally comforting, also avoids This question suggests that the construction responsibility. It also hints that all of the and use of aircraft, while a magnificent circumstances might be different if Japan sight and a technological achievement will was able to win against America and retain undoubtedly cause massive human its empire. Caproni’s choice of words is so suffering. As Jiro’s mentor and hero he casual that it makes war sound routine and admits, however reluctantly, “I chose a to be expected and survived. However, for world with pyramids” without ever even Japan’s neighboring countries this is a cruel considering visually or verbally what a dismissal that Japanese aggression is to be world without airplanes or pyramids would expected and it makes the carnage Japan look like. Jiro responds, “I just want to caused across Asia seem normal. His create beautiful airplanes.” 90 This is not influence is made worse when he sees the only a nod to the alleged quote that made Zero fighters and tells Jiro “there is your Miyazaki want to write this movie, but in fighter. Truly a beautiful design.” This reality is also a lazy rationalization. Jiro refocuses the legacy of the plane to the never openly considers just giving up his designer as if it was some kind of art, rather dream, pursuing it no matter what it costs than a fighter plane that was responsible for him or the people of the world, and the killing civilians and soldiers. Being more same could be said of dangerous criminals sympathetic than Caproni, Jiro mourns that or even the leaders of the regimes he “not a single one returned” which gives the disagrees with. This ambivalence to the impression that Jiro was somehow consequences of his actions, which is responsible for their deaths. However even suggested by Caproni, goes strongly Jiro’s sympathy is limited because he only against the pacifistic political arguments is focused on his own fellow Japanese and that Miyazaki writes in Neppu. While in the not on the Chinese, Korean, or Americans narrative this equates to persistence under it would kill during its use. Caproni tells the worst of conditions, manifesting as the Jiro that “airplanes are beautiful, cursed many obstacles Jiro must face to make his dreams waiting for the sky to swallow them masterpiece, it is evident that he should

89 The Wind Rises. 90 Ibid.

24 25 have never made it because it only led to national reverence in Japan. Because this more war. Even though the message is plane is an example of excellent Japanese positive on a personal level because Jiro engineering and military prowess it is chases glory and succeeds, it must be inspiring to nationalists, which is why evident to Miyazaki that the militaristic making a film about the designer of the Liberal Democratic Party is rebuilding the plane that promotes pacifism is so difficult. military not only to defend Japan but also in Admittedly, the film is artistically strong pursuit of national glory. What the Liberal and complex, but it only considers the Democrats like Abe are chasing, could be beauty of the aircraft and the adversity in phrased by Caproni as, their “beautiful making it and not the consequences of its dream” for Japan’s future. 91 The message manufacture. Miyazaki’s reverence for the of the film can be summed up as, you must fighter, evidenced in his desire to make a chase your dream no matter what internal or movie about its creator, corrupts his external obstacles get in your way, which is pacifistic stances because in the film he a very human and contradictory message, must justify why Jiro pushed so hard to but in a political context it is dangerously design the plane. In doing this he ignores open for interpretation. illustrating the destruction that the fighter While The Wind Rises was a caused visually, which is cinema’s most successful film commercially and critically, powerful tool, and settles on inconsistently it was so controversial because it distanced lamenting on the abstract consequences of the Japanese from war responsibility and war. This film could be called Miyazaki’s promoted ambivalence towards the global own Zero fighter because all he wanted to consequences of war because its focus was do was make something beautiful, but it so personal. The film does successfully might have done more harm to Miyazaki’s communicate the personal intentions of personal beliefs than good. director Hayao Miyazaki to make a Despite the protests of Miyazaki, complex contradictory film, but the subject and other pacifists in Japan, in 2014, the matter it focuses on had serious year after the release of The Wind Rises, the consequences for many people in recent Japanese government amended Article 9. history and in the present politically. While This change to the constitution gives Japan it does denounce war in the dialogue, the the power of “exercising ‘collective self- actions of the characters thrust the Japanese defense’, or aiding a friendly country under into a more competitive position against the attack.” 92 Like World War 2, and the Allies. The side the Japanese fought for was designing of the Zero fighter, the passing of totalitarian and based on obedience and the amendment might have been militarism, leading to a desire for colonial unavoidable, no matter how much the rule of their neighbors like China and pacifists protested the change. But one Korea. Despite Miyazaki’s writings in thing is for certain, the release of The Wind Studio Ghibli’s booklet Neppu, and his Rises, followed by the release of Eternal criticisms of the nationalistic and Zero did nothing but entice citizens and militaristic film, Eternal Zero, his film is politicians to revisit the glory of the Zero unable to snuff out their messages that stir fighter, and the misrepresented legacy of a longing in an audience for the glory of Japanese Imperialism. Japan’s military. This is because the film focuses on Jiro Horikoshi, the designer of the A6M Zero fighter plane, a symbol of

91 Ibid. Reuters, July 2, 2014 -japan-defense- 92 Linda Sieg and Kiyoshi Takenaka, “Japan Takes idUSKBN0F52S120140702. Historic Step Away from Post-War Pacifism,”

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