Princess Mononoke, Now Even More Epic
UNCOMPROMISING AND INDIGNANT
I was nine years old when I first saw «Princess Mononoke». It was at a family gathering, and my aunt decided to show us the film. I was confused and overwhelmed, as it was also my first exposure to anime. I still vividly remember the nightmares I had the following night: hordes of vermicelli-like wild boars chasing me, and severed arms flying at me from all directions.
The boar demon Nago actually plays only a minor role in «Princess Mononoke» – and yet it is this enraged creature that sets the story of the 1997 animated film in motion. To uncover the source of Nago’s curse, young Prince Ashitaka leaves his medieval Japanese village and travels west, where powerful animal deities and spirits are said to live. On his quest, he finds himself caught in a fierce battle between humans and nature.
With «Princess Mononoke», acclaimed filmmaker Hayao Miyazaki delivered one of his probably best films, one that not only left a lasting mark on the anime genre but also elevated the director’s work to a new level. Dark undertones had already appeared in Miyazaki’s earlier works, such as «Castle in the Sky» or «Porco Rosso» – but never were they as present as here. «Princess Mononoke» is an uncompromising, impassioned film that at the same time manages to celebrate the beauty of nature – and thereby also humanity.
A BLADE FOR HARVEY WEINSTEIN
Not only did Miyazaki reach a new artistic level with this film, but the director’s fame also grew with it. At the Japanese box office, «Princess Mononoke» was a huge success, one that Miyazaki would only surpass with his following film and later Oscar winner «Spirited Away». In the United States, where the director’s films had until then been treated very poorly and sometimes even re-edited, Miyazaki was able to make a name for himself.
The director and his producer Toshio Suzuki immediately took advantage of this new confidence: to the now-convicted sex offender Harvey Weinstein, who at the time was responsible for distributing the films in the U.S., they sent a katana. Included was a note reading: “No Cuts.” When asked about it, Miyazaki still chuckles mischievously today.
Unsurprisingly, «Princess Mononoke» was subsequently released uncut in American cinemas – with a dubbing script for which Weinstein at one point had reportedly intended to bring in none other than Quentin Tarantino. But even without his involvement, the anime has long since achieved cult status – including here in Switzerland:
Since 2022, «Princess Mononoke» has been selected a total of 21 times across Switzerland by THE ONES WE LOVE, with the film shown four times each in Zurich and Lucerne during that period.
The number of other films and series that have drawn inspiration from it shows the importance of «Princess Mononoke» for filmmaking: «Avatar: The Last Airbender» (2005–2008), «Snow White and the Huntsman» (2012), or more recently «The Mandalorian» (since 2019) – all have borrowed visually or narratively from Miyazaki’s masterpiece.
4K IS NOT ALWAYS TRUE 4K
The visual splendor of «Princess Mononoke» can now be admired in even higher resolution: the film has recently been restored as a 4K version, which from September 3 will be shown in collaboration with THE ONES WE LOVE exclusively in Pathé IMAX cinemas – for the time being, only in French-speaking Switzerland at Pathé Balexert. «Princess Mononoke» is a gigantic and epic work – which in its 4K release and on an IMAX screen is likely to appear even more gigantic and epic.
But beware: 4K restoration is not always true 4K – how good such an upgrade is always depends on the condition of the original material. Many live-action films, for example, exist only as a 2K copy, meaning that the image has to be artificially enhanced. This often involves the use of AI, which can sometimes misinterpret or overcorrect the footage. In such cases, people can quickly end up looking as if the Spanish pensioner who once inadequately restored the Jesus fresco had been at work.
Things are quite different with «Princess Mononoke»: because it is a film hand-animated on so-called cels (transparent animation sheets), and all of these were carefully archived, the restoration is easier. The cels were all scanned and reassembled exactly as they were at the time, allowing Miyazaki’s epic anime to be screened as a 4K version – without AI, without corrections.
That this must be experienced on the big screen goes without saying.
Unless, perhaps, you are a nine-year-old child who has never seen an anime before – then what you see might confuse and overwhelm you, leaving you with nightmares of vermicelli wild boars.
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