All of the Studio Ghibli movies, ranked - Entertainment Weekly
10. Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind (1984) ... The movie that made Studio Ghibli was technically produced before its founding, but since ...
Ponyo
Miyazaki's most minor work is a fusion of The Little Mermaid and Pinocchio, focusing on the titular goldfish girl who decides she wants to be human after encountering a boy named Sōsuke. Though <anchor>Ponyo</anchor> is decidedly aimed at a younger audience, the tsunami that Ponyo's father sends to retrieve her makes for one joyfully inventive sequence. — C.H.
Movie Review: Ponyo​
Movie Review: Ponyo​[Skip to content](#main)

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# Movie Review: Ponyo

This reimagined version of The Little Mermaid is profound and visually thrilling

By [Lisa Schwarzbaum](https://ew.com/author/lisa-schwarzbaum/)

Published on March 26, 2010 04:00AM EDT

![Ponyo](https://ew.com/thmb/3UPwPTZwwKD_uRvbLQeN8uBJaDs=/1500x0/filters:no_upscale():max_bytes(150000):strip_icc()/ponyo_l-95a3202ad0db4f85a6a2ea4318ea06bf.jpg)

Photo: Disney

**Ponyo**, an emotionally profound, visually thrilling animated reimagining of the classic fairy tale ”The Little Mermaid,” is another opportunity for the smitten to state the ?obvious: The work of the legendary Japanese animation artist Hayao Miyazaki is both ?unmistakable and inimitable. Forget about Ariel, the romanticized, selectively sexualized Disney mermaid. Miyazaki, whose previous masterpieces include _Howl’s ?Moving Castle_, _Princess Mononoke_, and the 2002 Academy Award winner _Spirited Away_, deepens the classic Hans Christian ?Andersen story so that it becomes a parable about keeping a planet in balance, and a vision of multigenerational love.

Employing traditional cel animation to ? produce a fireworks display of inventive ? imagery, Miyazaki’s version skips lightly, sweetly, and firmly over gender fussiness to introduce the heroine — Ponyo — as a strong, robust, trusting, loving little fish in the sea. And when Ponyo falls in love with a little boy named Sosuke, she decides that what she wants most (much to the distress of her ?sorcerer father) is to become a little land-based girl. Not surprisingly, big-name fans of the animator lined up to voice the English-language version, among them Tina Fey as Sosuke’s mother and Liam Neeson as Ponyo’s ecology-minded father. (Listen, too, for Cate Blanchett, Lily Tomlin, and Matt Damon.) Don’t tell Walt Disney, but Hayao Miyazaki ?really holds the keys to the magic kingdom. **A**

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