Grave of the Fireflies (Hotaru no Haka) (1988)

 

Grave of the Fireflies

This is just about the saddest movie ever made. “Grave of the Fireflies” (“Hotaru no Haka”) is a Studio Ghibli movie drawn and told for children, and I can only imagine the mayhem this have caused when shown to a bunch of six-year-olds. They will have been traumatized for life.

The movie opens with a scene from what looks like a train station. A young man/boy in rags die and the janitors throw his only possession, an old candy box, out into the fields. Where it lands, two ghosts appear, a boy and a little girl, and they drive away on a ghost train.

That sort of sets the stage.

In the final year of the second world war, Seita’s and Setsuko’s home is firebombed by American planes, and their mother dies from her gruesome injuries. Their father being away in the navy, means the two children are alone. Seita, a boy of presumably fourteen years, takes charge of his little sister, a girl of, again presumably, four years of age. An aunt takes them into her home, but before long she grows resentful of having two extra mouths to feed. She makes Seita sell all their mother’s stuff and take out her savings, but even with that she pesters the children so much they eventually leave.

Seita finds a disused bomb shelter that he turns into their new home. He scavenges for food and utensils and turns to stealing, but it is not enough. Eventually Setsuko gets ill from malnutrition and dies of starvation. Seita cremates her in a little coffin and quickly wastes away himself. This is not really a spoiler; we learn this in the first two minutes of the movie.

“Grave of the Fireflies” is drawn in that classic Ghibli style. It is not Miyazaki but Takahata who is behind this one, but it still very much looks like a Ghibli movie. The two main characters are very sympathetically drawn, and especially Setsuko is a very loveable little energy bomb. Classic animé style. This is a style very appealing to children and therefore “Grave of the Fireflies” looks like a children’s movie. This makes it so much harder to watch. The fate of these two children is likely not so unusual during the war, but we feel it with extra poignancy. Seita is way too young to have to take care of himself, much less have responsibility for his sister. He must grow up very fast, but even though he makes a heroic effort, it is not enough and that is so bitter an experience. In this type of movies, the good guys wins, effort pays off and through hardship people grow, but the world in “Grave of the Fireflies” is brutal and has no mercy for our protagonists. No matter how much Seita fights, he is doomed to a short life of suffering and death.

Setsuko is innocence personified. No matter how much Seita tries to shield her, she is also doomed. Letting such a child suffer seems like a horrible crime, yet this is the world they are facing. Everybody is busy taking care of themselves and their own and even an little girl like Setsuko finds no one but Seita to care for her. It is a scathing attack, until you understand that everybody was suffering. At the time the story takes place, Japan had been bombed to pieces, including by two nukes. Setsuko and Seita are simply the faces of all these unknown fates.

There is no doubt this is a beautiful movie, and it also feels like an important movie. I have seen it ranking very high on a number of lists and I cannot say this is not deserved. What I am struggling with is seeing this as a children’s movie. I found it very hard to watch and needed some breaks along the way. Try take your young child to the cinema to watch this, believing this is a cozy movie like “My Neighbour Totoro”? I wonder how many children sat through the entire movie.

I do like Ghibli movies and quality-wise this is among the best. My son, though, is the real expert. Still, he managed just about twenty minutes then he gave up. I would love to recommend it, but you need to be in a very special mood.