2013 Film of the Year Countdown: #28 (tie)

The Wind Rises (Hayao Miyazaki) [43 points / 5 votes]

"The modern is constantly bumping up against the traditional in The Wind Rises, like the wasen fishing boats sharing the water with warships. This kind of juxtaposition is unavoidable in Japan. It's a byproduct of a country with an ancient culture that has been forced to physically rebuild itself after multiple calamities, both natural and man-made. But it's all the more notable given that Miyazaki literally inserts every element of every shot by hand, in its proper place.

I mention this because a lot has been made of Miyazaki's apparent ambivalence toward the actions of his main character, Jiro Horikoshi, the chief engineer of the "Zero" bomber (so named for the last digit of the imperial year -- 2600 -- in which it was first deployed, another discrete link between the new and the very old). Miyazaki neither explicitly condemns nor glorifies this man's work despite the many thousands of lives it would eventually cost. In fact, the World War that is encroaching throughout the narrative is only depicted in one or two very late shots, and Horikoshi's only real acknowledgement is in voiceover, when he notes that none of his beautiful planes ever returned home. And while he pursued his dream of the perfect machine, his beautiful wife (a fictional element here) to whom he was devoted and who fully understood his obsession slipped away from him. It may not seem like much, but it's not like he gets off clean.

Miyazaki has been accused of whitewashing Japan's aggression, when nothing could be further from the truth. In fact, he sees a country increasingly prone to that exact behavior, to ignoring its own history in favor of a more reactionary traditionalism. As Horikoshi single-mindedly realizes his wish, either deliberately blind to or innocently ignorant of its consequences, Miyazaki draws a parallel with what he sees as his country's increasingly selective recontextualization of its history to serve an uncertain future. The Wind Rises isn't an ode to a perfect dream or a lionization of its dreamer, it's a gentle warning from a man who knows what it's like to give up his dreams to the world." -- Matt Lynch

(Mr. Lynch also wrote a similarly-striking appreciation of this film for Seattle's The Stranger, which you can read here. And you should. Go on, we'll wait.)