A new doc­u­men­tary reveals the genius of Hayao Miyazaki

In 2013, mas­ter direc­tor and ani­ma­tor Hayao Miyaza­ki announced his retire­ment from film­mak­ing. At a press con­fer­ence he explained that, ​“My era of fea­ture-length films is clear­ly over, I’ve decid­ed to treat any desire to con­tin­ue as the delu­sions of an old man.” As some­one who has threat­ened to leave the indus­try behind before, he added ​“This time I mean it.”

This is where direc­tor Kaku Arakawa comes in. His new doc­u­men­tary Nev­er-End­ing Man: Hayao Miyaza­ki fol­lows the Stu­dio Ghi­b­li co-founder in the wake of his deci­sion to quit film­mak­ing. It reveals that Miyaza­ki felt a strong urge to explore oth­er cre­ative dis­ci­plines, lead­ing him to begin exper­i­ment­ing with com­put­er-gen­er­at­ed ani­ma­tion despite hav­ing resist­ed it through­out his career.

“When I start­ed film­ing and fol­low­ing Miyaza­ki for this doc­u­men­tary, he kept say­ing that ​‘I am just a retired old man’,” Arakawa tells LWLies, ​“but when he start­ed work­ing togeth­er with young CGI artists, I could see his fire start­ed blaz­ing again.”

Miyaza­ki is a for­mi­da­ble and com­pli­cat­ed fig­ure, at times bash­ful and self-dep­re­cat­ing and oth­ers stern and cer­tain of his own artis­tic mer­it. ​“He impos­es him­self ​‘to become a slave of the film’,” Arakawa explains, ​“he makes him­self and every­one who works for the film con­tribute 100 per cent.” Along with his insight­ful obser­va­tions about life and cre­ativ­i­ty, he also has a sharp sense of humour. Just wait until you hear what he makes of Frozen’s ​‘Let it Go’.

The film offers a rare behind-the-scenes look into Miyazaki’s cre­ative process, and the dif­fi­cul­ties of adjust­ing to an artis­tic medi­um that is con­stant­ly evolv­ing. ​“Miyaza­ki had always been scep­ti­cal about CG ani­ma­tion,” Arakawa says – he has always ​“had a strong belief in hand drawing.”

This becomes a chal­lenge as the cel­e­brat­ed artist begins to craft his first CGI film with a new team of ani­ma­tors. The endeav­our tempts him back into ani­mat­ing, a demand­ing process that brings him both frus­tra­tion and joy. His strug­gle to rekin­dle his pas­sion and cre­ate some­thing new and beau­ti­ful leads to more philo­soph­i­cal enquiries into youth, inven­tion and ageing.

When asked what he had learned from the mas­ter of ani­ma­tion, Arakawa answered that ​“he made me realise that if your pas­sions are aroused, you could do any­thing”. This inti­mate explo­ration of the lat­er years of a bona fide genius touch­es on regret, des­tiny, and the chang­ing face of animation.

Nev­er-End­ing Man: Hayao Miyaza­ki airs on NHK WORLD TV on 3 June at 16:10 and 22:10, and again on 4 June at 4:10 and 10:10.