overdarklord I watched "the wind rises" for the first time back when it came out and i remember beeing very dissapointed with it. Now 4 years later I finaly rewatched the movie and I have to say, my opinion didnt change at all.I think the movie has 2 major problems. One is that the movie has no focus. The movie is about 2 hours long and tries to cover the life of plane engineer Jirou Horikoshi, with his childhood, his experience with the Tokyo earthquake of 1923, his travels to europe, his plane building career and his love life with his wife. In addidtion to all of that the movie has a lot of dream sequences. I think of all these aspects only the dream sequences seemes finished, everything else is just an unfinished product, cut short of what its suppost to be. Take his wife for example: they spend so little time introducing his wife and his relationship to her that ultimately we, as the audience dont care about her and everything that happens to her. I mean, really , what do we know about his wife?... that she likes to paint and loves the main character... thats it. The parts the movie should have focused on (the plane building parts) where cut short and rushed to find time for unecessary "slice of life" elements half way through the film. This completely ruins the tone of the movie.The second major problem is the main character. He is too unemotional and boring. His life goal is to create planes, but did we ever see him get upset when one of his designes didnt work, or really happy when it does? Sure Japan has a more emotionless culture but at home when he is not under people there should have been at least a few scenes where we can see his frustration or joy. Nothing is seen from this character. He succeed in so many parts that he as a character seems so unrealisticly anyways( he is a genius plane designer, speaks multiple languages, is physically strong, etc). All characters around him have more emotion and feel more realisitc than this guy.The art of the movie was fine, it was the usual ghibli style but I find unusual that many scenes seemed kinda weird, either out of propotion or unrealisitic stuff happens (like the earthquake).The sounddesign was not so fine, the soundtrack itself was fine and the voiceacting as well, but often backgroundnoises where cut to such a minimum that the whole scene seemed unrealisitc. Its such a weird design choice.So now I go into a few minor things that bug me about this movie. First of all, at the start of the movie the main character defends a young kid, which kinda tells you he has some sense of justice, which then later was completely contradicted by the fact that he builds warplanes. Sure I can understand him for just building plane for the purpose of building planes, but activley helping a nation that kills millions of people in war (an he should know that, I mean he hangs around foreingers all the time) is at least worthy of discussion. In my opinion they should have given his sister this sense of justice and SHE should have confronted him with this dilemma... he then defends himself and we understand him as a character better. The way it is, the main character hardly ever talks about his point of view or his opinion about MANY things going on around him, which is weird since the movie is a biography about the dude.Second point: In the japanese version his wife yells "Nicu catchu" in the scene where he catches the umbrella. A very weird thing to say and it more reminds me of Japanese spoken in modern times than back then. Sure she has been around foreigners, but then she would have a better accent. Its just something I saw in no other movie depicting Japan before WW2, which is btw a lot.Third and last point: the ending is very unfulfilling and weird. The dialoge spoken in most of the dream sequences is utterly idiotic and shallow but the ending takes the cake. They always speak about Japan blowing up, the millions of life it will cost isnt even worth wrapping your head around, it seems. Then the Italien says something like: "Why would the pilots want to come back from war anyways?"... I dont know, maybe to live their lifes? It seems like the dreamsequences wanted to be profound and symbolic but it came around as more shallow and idiotic in my opinion.So in gerneral: This movie was terrible. If it wasn't for the sudden inclusion of slice of life romance half way through and the idiotic ending I could have accepted it as a decent shallow movie about an emotionless character building planes. The movie would have been pretty boring for everyone not interested into planes or technology in general but it would have been a nice watch for me. Now the only thing that makes this movie watchable was the artstyle and maybe the premise, but you sure notice that the premise tricks you into such a flat storyline.

Leo Baudinet As I child I watch about 20 times the marvelous movie Spirited Away. For two years, I started to get interested in cinema so that to watch all the masterpieces the cinema has to offer. Thus, it was time to watch all of the brilliant Japanese director's movies.The Wind Rises is just astonishing and differs a lot about all that Miyazaki did before. This movie is much more realistic than Miyazaki previous works. Obviously, every single movie presents different characteristics (My Neigbor Totoro is more childish for example) but the main point is often Man's position on Earth or the Universe. In The Wind Rises, Miyazaki deals with the position of Man in his own life and our relation with our dreams.The topics which provide to the movie a very realistic aspect are quite hard: Natural disaster, Disease, War... Nevertheless, Miyazaki superbly brings to light Dreams and Humanity through lovely characters (Jiro, Caproni, Naoko, Honjo, Castorp, Kurokawa)."Le Vent se lève... il faut tenter de vivre"Thanks Hayao Miyazaki

subxerogravity ...And the story is so excellent it could have been a live action film Studio Ghibli at it's best and animation at it's best. how did the Oscars pass up on this for the win!? Plus I'm showing favoritism as the movie is about one of my favorite subjects, Aviation.Somewhere in-between The Great War and World War II lies Jiro, a young Japanese man who becomes a fan of an Italian airplane designer and shares his dream (Literately in the sense of the movie) of designing air crafts, and the movie goes through his process, as well as him finding love.I don't know if this is a true story or how inspired by true events the movie is, but the Zero fighter that Jiro designs was used by the Japanese in World War 2. I do know the title comes form a poem. The Wind Rises, what a perfect title for a movie about Aviation.Anyway, The Wind Rises is like a painting in movement. the complete extension of what I want from animation. There was one scene in which Japan suffered an earthquake and with animation, they intensified the scene making it look like the ground just had a hiccup and caused all this chaos and destruction. it was brilliant.So I'm sorry, as good as Frozen is I think the Oscars made the wrong choice in not given the Wind Rises the trophy.

Counthaku *Warning- Spoilers* Where to start. The seemingly effortless animation, the trademark Studio Ghibli expressions and style, the side characters (i.e. Jiro's boss, Mr. Kurokawa) so full of life, the background characters who genuinely seem to have personalities of their own, the juxtaposition of classical music with the destruction of Japan, the character study of an altruistic, idealistic man who sees his efforts ultimately go up in flames- The Wind Rises doesn't fit neatly in the typical three act structure of most films, yet despite this lack of the usual narrative arc, it's completely engrossing from start to finish. Though I would still rank Spirited Away as Miyazaki's crowning achievement, this film is, in a way, in a different category from Spirited Away, and many of the other Ghibli movies, for that matter. It lacks any blatantly fantastical character and because of this deals with mature themes such as regret and moral ambiguity in a way that feels much more piercing.That final scene is an unbelievable mix of tragedy and optimism. It's implied that Japan is in ruins thanks to Jiro's work, his wife has succumbed to tuberculosis, and the 10 best years of Jiro's life are behind him. Yet "live," Jiro's deceased wife urges him. And so he does, joining his Italian hero for drinks.