The beautiful animation that draws more inspiration from European film than anything else that Japan was making at the time gives Princess Arete a leg up on a lot of the other animated film coming out of Japan at the same time, which makes it a shame that this went so far underneath the radar. Following a princess who is tired of her suitors, the film could have easily been a plucky girl-power story but instead finds wonder in stories and wonder in a way that makes Tangled - which came out ten years later - feel cloying and annoying. There's a stillness here that many have compared to Ghibli films, but Studio4c has its own sense of awe to it that feels a lot more inward than outward. This does allow for a lot of payoff later on as Arete eventually leaves the castle and the cages of the terms of her engagement only to be trapped and controlled by another man - and then form a deep friendship with another girl. The way by which Arete functions as a protagonist, still having some agency even when some of it is stripped away, is wonderful. Would genuinely love to see a blu ray of this
The beautiful animation that draws more inspiration from European film than anything else that Japan was making at the time gives Princess Arete a leg up on a lot of the other animated film coming out of Japan at the same time, which makes it a shame that this went so far underneath the radar. Following a princess who is tired of her suitors, the film could have easily been a plucky girl-power story but instead finds wonder in stories and wonder in a way that makes Tangled - which came out ten years later - feel cloying and annoying. There's a stillness here that many have compared to Ghibli films, but Studio4c has its own sense of awe to it that feels a lot more inward than outward. This does allow for a lot of payoff later on as Arete eventually leaves the castle and the cages of the terms of her engagement only to be trapped and controlled by another man - and then form a deep friendship with another girl. The way by which Arete functions as a protagonist, still having some agency even when some of it is stripped away, is wonderful. Would genuinely love to see a blu ray of this
