Listen to these words: I do not like environmentalist films. Movies like "Once Upon a Forest," "Ferngully," "Happy Feet," and really any movie where humans are made out to be the bad guy for developing land makes me cringe beyond belief. I hate them. They are wastes of my time. I don't want people to make them. They always demonize humans. I will never, ever support a project that seeks to do this. There, I said it. And I meant it too. But see, here's the problem. This is why I wasn't looking forward to writing this blog.
The 1994 anime known as "Pom Poko" is an environmentalist film... and I loved it.
First of all, I feel absolutely filthy all over. Seriously, I am sick to my stomach. I want to just crawl into a hole and die. I'm experiencing all kinds of horrible regret for ever watching the movie. Yet... it was one of the most wonderful things I ever saw. And I can't get it out of my head. There were so many moments I just wanted to jump in there and be a part of it. So if you would: I need you to hear me out while I attempt to explain myself. Believe me, this is hard on me. Ouch. It hurts.
"Pom Poko" goes deeply into the fairy lore of the tanuki or Japanese raccoon. I mentioned them before in one of my animal spotlight blogs. I also brought up "Pom Poko" as well which I had not yet been able to see. The story is set in, I believe, the 60's or 70's while Tokyo was going through a major land development phase. This development was eating away at the land where the raccoons lived. Sound familiar? That's right! It's the formula for every environmentalist movie of the 1990s! As soon as I realized this, I groaned because I figured I was going to hate the film and I had two hours of it to watch.
The raccoons decided to wage war on the humans to stop them from developing. They would use their special transformation abilities to accomplish this as well as some interesting techniques involving their... testicles. At times, the raccoons would simply try and scare the humans away by preying on their superstitions. At other times, they would get violent and try to, and even sometimes succeed, at killing them. The movie is about this particular war.
The movie is steeped in Japanese folk lore. Although it centered around the magical past of the tanukies, it also went into the kitsune (foxes). The differences were made very clear and the contrast was wonderful. We find that both the raccoons and the foxes had transforming abilities and could even pretend to be us. It even went so far as to suggest that they were living among us regularly--something they were forced to do when there was no forest to live in.
So why did I like it? Well one theory is that the raccoons and their lore were so well presented that I just decided to overlook the environmentalist plotline. In the same way, I could have just adored how cute the raccoons were leaving me with the same result. Actually both of these are true, but there is more. For one, the movie never out-rightly demonizes humans. In fact, the raccoons seem to rather admire us in the film. They want what we have. They want to live in comfortable houses, watch TV, and eat fast food. But... they don't want to work for it. The tanukis of the movie are incredibly lazy. So living in a forest just suits them better.
The humans are basically accused of ignorance. They would help the raccoons if they knew it was really a problem. But since they don't understand that there are other lives affected, they develop for themselves violently and also indiscriminately. The movie never even once calls human development evil and even encourages it. It just wants human being to not overdo it and keep the animals in mind.
It was a tradition in American environmentalist films to make the land developers into sneering, evil, animal-hating beasts who adored the idea of tearing up land and making money. "Pom Poko" never does this. It was enough to put me in a happy place where I could enjoy the attempts of the tanukis to fight against the clearly confused humans. They were lovable to the end. I even rooted for them here and there.
Yes, this is the definitive tanuki movie out there. It will educate you deeply into the fairy tale lore of the Japanese raccoon. And it is probably the only environmental movie I will ever like. It never felt like they were shoving it down my throat. The story stuck with the characters and their situation. They stayed true to writing a wonderful story with very interesting characters. I can honestly say that I would love to meet one of those big, fat, lovable things!
Thank you for reading my blog! Did you like it? Did you hate it? Either way, you can comment below, or you can email me at tkwadeauthor@gmail.com. Also! You can visit my website at www.tkwade.com. Thanks!
Don't feel too bad enjoying this movie. I love the artwork of an artist who has troops of U.S. Cavalry women easily and readily slaughtered by American Indian women. The theme is "white guilt being punished" but in a context of SILENCING THE SENTRY or HERO VS. THRONGS: my personal favorites. About the tanuki and kitsune: the legends are probably based on raccoon and fox versions of cynocephaly type demons. These hybrids would be sentient creatures with the tendencies of their feral natures.
ReplyDeleteOh, I figured they were based on demons. The foxes in the movie did not really come across as so much evil as they were willing to do bad things as a matter of survival. It was just a part of their nature. The tanukis did not want to do stuff like that but they were open to it.
DeleteI have noticed that in Japanese animation, they prefer conservation over environmentalism. I had a similar experience where the cartoon dealt with similar subject matter. The desire was not to halt progress, but to promote stewardship.
ReplyDeleteI liked this response and told everyone about it. I did not know that and it fit well with the movie as well as with things I'd known of the Japanese people in general. It isn't a bad thing.
DeleteI'm glad you liked the movie. I remember all those horrible environmentalist movies that portrayed humans as evil and greedy. We were given dominion of the animals of this earth so it is our choice if we are to create a wasteland or a paradise, human progress does not have to be destructive we were meant to be creators that keep going further into space and beyond. The Georgia Guidestones are quite specific about the Demonic solution to maintain natural balance, this is a perversion of the Truth, these entities lack Imagination. A lack of imagination is to blame for our dependency on fossil fuels in the 21st century, progress demands a better solution Demons attempt to fill in the gaps and maintain the machine with no regard for Humanity's progress.
ReplyDeleteWell, I don't think we should destroy things indiscriminately just so long as human progress comes first before animals. The planet belongs to us.
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