- Acclaimed anime master Hayao Miyazaki returns for his ninth animated feature with Ponyo, which deals with a friendship between a five-year-old boy and a goldfish princess who yearns to be human. The daughter of the king of the ocean, Ponyo is no ordinary goldfish -- she has all the magic of the sea at her disposal. But when five-year-old Sosuke befriends the spunky little fish near the seaside home he shares with his mother and father, a special connection sparks between the two children, and Ponyo becomes determined to become human. Transforming into a little girl, Ponyo shows up at Sosuke's doorstep, delighted to make herself at home with her new land-dwelling family. But having a magical fish princess walking around on dry land begins setting the mystical balance of the world off kilter, and even though the innocent love Ponyo feels for her dear friend is strong, it will take some help from the greatest powers in the ocean to make things right again. ~ Jeremy Wheeler, Rovi
- Menu
Disc #1 -- Ponyo
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Bonus Features
Disc Introduction - Meet Ponyo
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English
Japanese
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English for the Hearing Impaired
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Sneak Peeks
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Muppets Studio DC Almost Live: Extended Edition
The Princess and the Frog
Tinker Bell and the Great Fairy Rescue
Toy Story Toy Story 2
Friends for Change Project Green
Genuine Treasure
Toy Story 3
Movie Rewards
Disney Blu-ray Magic in Hihg-Def
Beauty and the Beast
The World of Ghibli
- Chapters
Disc #1 -- Ponyo
1. Prelude / Ocean Wonderland
2. The Beginning / Main Title
3. Ponyo Gets Caught
4. Late for School
5. Ponyo Speaks!
6. Return to the Sea
7. Transformation
8. Ponyo's Typhoon
9. Almost Home
10. It's Ham!
11. The Moon's Gravity
14. A Magical Ship
15. From Sea to Land
16. Where Is Mom?
17. Underwater Paradise
18. Sosuke's Test
19. Balance Restored
20. End Credits
- Features
Disc -1 blu-ray:
The World of Ghibli - Visit Ponyo in this extraordinary interactive experience!
Enter the Lands - Meet the characters and hear the story of the movie
Behind the studio - Discover the film's inspiration through documentaries, including all-new interviews with Hayao Miyazaki
Meet Ponyo - Disc inroduction with the producers
Storyboard presentation of the movie
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Directors
Hayao Miyazaki
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Producers
Toshio Suzuki
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Composers (Music Score)
Joe Hisaishi
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Editors
Takeshi Seyama
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Screen Writers
Melissa Mathison
Hayao Miyazaki
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Others
Animator - Katsuya Kondo
Associate Producer - Paul Cichocki
Associate Producer - Kevin Reher
Background Artist - Noburo Yoshida
Casting - Natalie Lyon
Composer (Music Score) - Joe Hisaishi
Executive Producer - Kathleen Kennedy
Executive Producer - Frank Marshall
Executive Producer - John Lasseter
Executive Producer - Koji Hoshino
Sound/Sound Designer - Shuji Inoue
Translator - Jim Hubbert
Voice Director - John Lasseter
Voice Director - Brad Lewis
Voice Director - Peter Sohn
Hayao Miyazaki has an unmistakable vision when it comes to making movies. Unlike anything else in the realm of animated film -- including the fantastically innovative examples from Pixar -- his films are crazy, visceral, epic fairy tales about the burden of growing up and taking responsibility for your world. Some of his more complex works tackle even bigger themes, about humanity's ambivalence between beauty and destruction (especially in works like
Princess Mononoke and
Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind). But
Miyazaki has also shown an aptitude for telling a different kind of story: tales that manifest in sweet, delightful, nearly conflict-free fables centering on small children, and usually cinematically narrated with the purity of a child's perception. He's hinted at this in many of his past efforts, but he hasn't constructed an entire movie this way since 1988's
My Neighbor Totoro. That is, until 2009's
Ponyo.
A new, very different take on the premise of
Hans Christian Andersen's The Little Mermaid,
Ponyo is about a precocious little fish named Brünnhilde, whose father just happens to be the flamboyant and sinewy king of the sea. Determined to reach the surface and explore new places, the aquatic princess makes a break for it, and happens to meet a five-year-old boy named Sosuke, who lives in a house overlooking the ocean in a tiny fishing village with his mother, Lisa, and his father, a fisherman who is often away. After rescuing his tiny friend from being stuck inside a discarded glass jar, Sosuke makes a strange, instant connection with the little goldfish, whom he names Ponyo. Ponyo's oddly human face soon shows that she loves her new best friend as well, but of course, her father cannot allow a magical princess fish to straddle the worlds of sea and land -- it upsets the mystical balance of the world, and begins to interfere with the tides and the moon. But the innocent love between Ponyo and Sosuke is too profound to restrain her, and she wills herself to transform into human form, first springing funny little feet that make her look like a chicken, and soon changing all the way into an adorable five-year-old girl, with hair the same red color that her iridescent scales used to be.
A splendid, gentle adventure follows, as Ponyo's mother, a huge, ethereal sea goddess, weighs in on the issue to state that if the pure love of the two children is as strong as it seems, then Ponyo can be permanently granted a human form, thus restoring the earth's balance. The adorable children thenceforth engage in extremely brave, always cute antics, as they face the floods wrought by the sea storm that brought Ponyo to land in the first place. All along the way in this delightful fable,
Miyazaki shows his incredible aptitude for understanding how children talk, move, and most importantly, think. That he's able to so deftly narrate in child-mind is so touching, it would almost be poignant -- if it weren't so resiliently uplifting and sweet. The movie also shows the usual
Miyazaki brand of worldly divination. Everything in the story's environment shows the magical spark of life; even the ocean's waves are capable of opening a squinty eye to reveal their intent. For American audiences -- even those that aren't familiar with
Miyazaki's style -- it's a movie with all the heart of Pixar's best and a giant dose of its own unique, rapturous charm, making it timeless enough for children and grown-ups alike. ~ Cammila Albertson, Rovi