The Boy and the Heron

Grade: A-

The Japanese animated film The Boy and the Heron tells the story of a boy who embarks on an epic odyssey in search of his mother. In that respect, it’s a worthy bookend to Beau Is Afraid from earlier this year. The Boy and the Heron contains some of the most gorgeous and random imagery of the year. It must take a special kind of mind – or maybe one under the influence of something – to come up with what we see in this movie. As awe-inspiring as it looks, what struck me the most was the sound. I couldn’t possibly list them all, but every last footstep, wing flap, hoof clomp, and heaven knows what else all sets a palpable atmosphere. It could be an audio book or radio program.

Writer/director Hayao Miyazaki (Princess Mononoke, Spirited Away) fits so much substance into the 124 minute runtime. A couple of years after the war, fires across Tokyo force young Mahito and his father to his family’s sprawling estate in the countryside. Mahito’s mother wasn’t so lucky, and dad does a quick copy-and-paste with a new wife in no time.

Life at the new house is interesting, even before the mysterious talking grey heron shows up. More about him in a minute. The house is populated with 10-15 little old ladies, who don’t look that different from those little wooden dolls that fit in your hand and are often used as game pieces or decoration. I won’t say exactly why, but Mahito is visited by a strange bird that occasionally looks like there’s a man inside, wearing the bird as a costume. Sometimes his head pokes out from the beak. I’ve explained it the best I can. It will somewhat make a little more sense when you see it. Also, for reasons I won’t completely reveal, Mahito descends into another world, with some of the oddest things I’ve seen in a movie. Eventually I stopped asking why, and just laughed and went with it.

The movie is playing in two rotating formats: either with its original Japanese dialogue accompanied by subtitles, or you can see it dubbed in English. I chose the latter, due to the star power of the voice talent. The cast is rounded out by the likes of Christian Bale, Dave Bautista, Gemma Chan, Willem Dafoe, Mark Hamill, Robert Pattinson, and Florence Pugh – all instantly recognizable. I’m usually a proponent of seeing foreign language films with the original audio and subtitles of your choice. You get the emotions of the actors who were in the scene in the moment, as opposed to people who read lines from a comfortable studio months after the fact. Since The Boy and the Heron is a cartoon, everybody was in a studio, so we can call it a wash.

2023 has been a year with some outstanding animated movies. Elemental and Wish were no slouches. The underrated Ruby Gillman, Teenage Kraken didn’t make as much noise as it should have. Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem weren’t my favorites, but they looked great and resonated with many viewers. However, The Boy and the Heron rises to the top like a dumpling in soup, and emerges the best of the lot. There is limitless imagination and originality at play here – occasionally too much. From time to time, everything overflows and starts to feel drug-trippy. Nevertheless, it’s one of the most ineffaceable, visually beautiful, innovative movies of the year. I want to see it again. You and the family really should, too.

Grade: A-