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Pom Poko Director: Isao Takahata Number of Items: 1 Format: Animated, Color, Closed-captioned, Widescreen Audience Rating: PG (Parental Guidance Suggested) Running Time: 119 minutes Studio: Buena Vista Home Vid Product Group: DVD Release Date: 2005-08-16 Buy from Amazon |
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From Amazon.com Isao Takahata's outré ecological fable Pom Poko was the no. 1 domestic film in Japan in 1994, and the first animated feature to be submitted for the Oscar for Foreign Language Film. In 1967, the raccoons in the Tama Hills find their homes are threatened with destruction when developers turn the rural area into suburbs. Under the leadership of their tribal elders the animals fight back with every resource at their disposal. Raccoons are shape-shifters in Japanese folk tales, and the members of this tribe can transform into objects, other creatures and even humans. Unlike Takahata's deeply moving The Grave of the Fireflies, Pom Poko (the sound made by thumping the tummy of a comfortably full raccoon) is a broad comedy. The raccoons' efforts to understand humans, their evocations of traditional ghost stories to frighten construction crews, and their internecine quarrels offers plenty of laughs. But the story rambles, and the characters lack the depth needed to sustain the audience's interest until the film's belated, downbeat conclusion. The extras include Takahata's storyboards, which are interesting, but lack the magic of Hayao Miyazaki's drawings on other Studio Ghibli discs. Note: male raccoons have prominent testicles, which are shown in Japanese art, including the designs for Pom Poko. When the characters grow desperate, they swell their scrotums to enormous size and use them as weapons. (Rated PG, Parental Guidance Suggested: violence, scary images and thematic elements) --Charles Solomon From Description Walt Disney Home Entertainment Presents A Studio Ghibli Film. POM POKO is a tale of the clash between modern civilization and the natural world. The Raccoons of the Tama Hills are being forced from their homes by the rapid development of houses and shopping malls. As it becomes harder to find food and shelter, they decide to band together and fight back. The Raccoons practice and perfect the ancient art of transformation until they are even able to appear as humans. In often hilarious ways, the Raccoons use their powers to try to scare off the advancement of civilization. But will it be enough? Or will the Raccoons learn how to live in balance with the modern world? Celebrate the magic of the forest and the beauty of the creatures who live among us in POM POKO — on DVD for the first time ever.~(c)1994 Hatake Jimusho · GNH (c)Buena Vista Home Entertainment, Inc.~~ |
 "Monkey-wrenching racoons!"This is another indication of how surprisingly wonderful the Studio Ghibli films can be. This film brings ancient Japanese traditions to life in a remarkably modern story, told after the fashion of a nature documentary. I loved to see the racoons monkey-wrenching a new development in Japan that threatened their habitat. For open-minded children of all ages, this is a magical ecological fable. For children too young to understand the, um, transforming body parts, or for parents too uptight to acknowledge that an animal's sex organs are perfectly natural to show in what is effectively a nature story, the Disney-dubbed English version of this story calls them "racoon pouches." The Japanese is also included though, and the subtitles for the Japanese version are much more literal.  "Good, but straaaaaange..."Out of all the Ghibli films released so far in the United States, this is by far the strangest. At least to American eyes; the tanukis are familiar to Japanese audiences, and this film is steeped in Japanese folklore and Japanese history. Disney, releasing Ghibli's work stateside, has done its best to translate this odd film. And believe me, they had their work cut out for them! This film is nothing like Ghibli's best-known work, Spirited Away. Because Spirited Away dealt with universal themes like family, overcoming hardship, and childhood fears of abandonment, the story remains gripping despite the odd cultural milieu of a Japanese bathhouse. But Pom Poko leans so heavily on culture that it's jarring stateside, even to diehards like me who know the culture. Both the original Japanese version, with subtitles, and the English dub is on the same disk. The English version is heavily Americanized - which just this once, really helps. In one example out of many, in the English version, one of the animals says that he feels like Rip van Winkle, while in the original Japanese version, he mentions Urashima Taro - the Japanese equivalent. Two other noteworthy points about the translation. These creatures are called "raccoons" throughout the movie. However, they're actually tanuki, an animal native to Japan that (if you're a scientist) is more closely related to a dog than a raccoon. But to lay people, they're more like raccoons in all other respects - appearance, behavior, diet, and the fact that they're considered pranksters (just like raccoons in Native American myth). So it makes sense that the Disney release calls them raccoons - for all intents and purposes, they are. More interestingly, in Japanese myth, tanuki are said to have giant testicles with magical properties. This is shown in Pom Poko - although the English-language version euphemistically refers to the scrotum as a "raccoon pouch." If you have small children in the home, they might not notice that when the tanuki go into battle, the part of them that magically expands looks a lot like the testicles. And if they're old enough to notice, they're old enough to deal with it. Forgive me if I haven't even got around to descibing the story yet. That's because (at least to me) watching the film is a lot like plowing through this review - there's a lot you have to deal with before you're ready to delve into the story itself. Pom Poko shows how the tanuki deal with the loss of their forests as humans turn their beloved homes into concrete suburbs. They try to fight back, but despite a few victories here and there, they're overwhelmed, and many of them die in the process. The story is a fascinating combination of wacky humor, poignant drama and even nature documentary. It's a beautiful film to watch, although it does take some getting used to. The Americanization really does help. On another note, it would have been nice if the DVD extras had included a primer on the myths surrounding the tanuki, and the animals themselves. No such luck, though. Fortunately, information on the animals (Nyctereutes procyonoides viverrinus) is readily available on the Internet. I would recommend this movie ONLY for anyone who is already a fan of Japanese animation and Studio Ghibli in particular. For those who are just starting out, I would recommend just about any other Ghibli film instead of this one. There are many to choose from: The Cat Returns, Kiki's Delivery Service, Porco Rosso, and Spirited Away are just a few.  "Foreign at the surface, lovely at the core."Fans who remember Isao Takahata best for his relentless tearjerker, GRAVE OF THE FIREFLIES, could very well react with surprise and shock upon viewing POM POKO. This lavishly animated tale about raccoons battling for their homeland (which was the biggest hit of 1994 in Japan) isn't so much a heartwrenching tragedy as it is an interesting amalgam of humor, drama, and action--all delivered in a way that is daringly original for animation. At times, the viewer gets treated to scenes which recall the one-two-three emotional punch of GRAVE OF THE FIREFLIES, but even though the tone of the movie is somber, a handful of lighthearted moments elevate the overall production out of depression. As this is a Studio Ghibli film, production values are spectacular. Backgrounds are painted with a tasteful mixture of simplicity and art, and the raccoons are as cuddlesome as you would expect--especially when they shape-shift from "ordinary" animals to Saturday-morning-cartoon style critters in the style of shows such as CARE BEARS. (If you're scratching your head while reading this, don't be alarmed--according to Japanese folklore, raccoons have the power to transform into anything--including human beings!) The actual animation is as colorful and imaginative as you might expect from a Ghibli movie--and there is one scene where we are treated to cameo appearances by Porco Rosso, Kiki, and Totoro. While POM POKO has a story to tell and a meaningful message for one to think about, its character and plot aspects may come across as a bit off-putting to viewers expecting a typical animated feature. Indeed, while some raccoons identify themselves with distinguishable names and/or personalities (for example, Gonta is a burly, rough-and-ready raccoon who is always looking for a fight, while Oroku is the "wise woman" of the tribe), the story offers little in the way of character development. In fact, most of the action in the story is narrated (by Maurice LaMarche in English, Kokondei Shinchou in Japanese), which elevates the overall effect of the movie to that of a semi-documentary. For the most part, this approach works to a very interesting degree and is a refreshing change of pace. However, there were some scenes in the movie where I wished the narration could have been reduced a little bit, as it sometimes gets in the way of appreciating the beauty of the visuals onscreen. Aside from this, the biggest controversy about POM POKO seems to be centered on several scenes where the raccoons can inflate and/or transform their testicles(!) for multiple purposes. One particular scene involves a raccoon flattening his testicles against a truck, causing its driver to crash. Such moments may be alarming to children, but it is important to remember that while we see the testicles at times, the movie is, after all, animated. Even still, while a Japanese audience may take such scenes naturally, squeamish viewers in America could react differently. In fact, as a solution to handling this kind of translation issue, the English language version (produced once again by Disney) refers to the testicles as "pouches". That's a somewhat awkward decision, but it sure beats digitally removing the testicles from the scenes they're in. POM POKO was obviously a nightmare for English dub writers Cindy and Donald Hewitt to translate (especially since much of the movie is rooted in Japanese culture), but I really have to commend them for their efforts. There is some Americanizing here and there, but there was little, if any, that I could find missing in their script. In fact, I was most impressed at how they handled the songs; while at least two of them come across as a little contrived and/or corny, others flow so naturally that you never would have sworn that these were originally Japanese folksongs. Another interesting aspect of the dub is the voice acting. With the exception of Jonathan Taylor Thomas (star of TV's HOME IMPROVEMENT), the cast consists of veteran performers who are known for cartoon voice work; Tress MacNeille, John DiMaggio, Russi Taylor, Andre Stojka, and Clancy Brown, to name a few. Whether this was done to cut down on costs for big-name stars or for avoiding aural distraction is unclear, but when listening to the spirit and energy that the aforementioned voice artists give their characters, it really doesn't matter. For purists, though, the original Japanese language track IS included on the DVD, as is a gorgeous visual transfer (and a disappointingly skimpy supply of extras--the only low point of this otherwise top-notch presentation from Disney). POM POKO may be an unusual entry from Isao Takahata, and its foreign aspects may not appeal to everyone, but if given a chance, the film offers a colorful display of imagination and pathos as well as an experience unlike many that one will find from ordinary cartoons. "Tree-hugger movie"Not action packed, but lots of fun with a "tree hugger" nature-saver theme. A bunch of raccoons are getting squeezed out of their habitat by development. Raccoons are one of the animals that can change shape and using that talent, they try to scare the humans away, but ultimately fail to progress. Finally using their talents to adapt to their new environment. "WARNING: Scrotums"Pom Poko. I would like to save a lot of people a lot of letter paper that would otherwise be used to send complaints to Disney about this film: If you don't like the thought of your children watching a film where a raccoon can inflate his scrotum large enough to obscure the windscreen of a lorry, you really do not want to buy this film. On the other hand, if you can accept that in Japan these creatures are thought of as having special powers to shape-shift at will (hence numerous well-endowed Tanuki statues dotted about the Japanese landscape) and that the whole testicle/shape-shifting thing is just treated as a matter-of-fact traditional belief over there (unlike in the west where the population would be 50% giggling and 50% writing letters of complaint), there is a good two-hour film here with jokes, romance, action and an unexpected complexity and warmth. Some imagery such as in the parade may scare some small children though, and anyone who believes that those things really are 'pouches' (as they are referred to in the US dub) needs a quick chat with their doctor. Do not think however that everything will make sense - as mentioned, the film draws heavily on eastern folklore and has bhuddist/shinto symbolism everywhere. The English dub is pretty good given the subject matter but there are a couple of bits that probably will confuse people simply because of the culture clash. Overall though its pretty coherent, and the subtitles do include a literal Japanese translation option this time. Extras-wise the DVD is let down - I dont know if anyone looks for more than a few seconds at the second storyboard disks rendering them pretty obsolete, but also unlike the other Ghibli releases, this one has no 'Behind the Microphone' either, or any featurettes translated from the Japanese like Nausicaa and Spirited Away had. You get a couple of the original trailers and thats about it - which is why this review dropped a star. |
