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Saturday, February 18, 2023

THE CAT RETURNS / NEKO NO ONGAESHI (2002)

Initiated as a cat-themed anime short to accompany a proposed amusement park ride, a project that never happened, the resulting feature from Studio Ghibli seems unlikely to prompt someone into building one.  In his only feature film, director Hiroyuki Morita brings uninspired visuals to an uninspired no-good-deed-goes-unpunished story about a school girl who saves a cat from a speeding truck then lives to regret the consequences when an army of streetwise talking cats insist she marry their Cat Prince.  Luckily, there’s another gang of magical cats (and other animals) on hand, ready to get her out of trouble . . . if only she can find them.  Charmless by-the-numbers stuff , especially from this source (did Ghibli borrow executives from DreamWorks?), and they seem to have known it, giving this film the shortest running time of any Ghibli film.  (Less the end-credits, it’s a bit under 70".)  An all-star English-language track sucks out whatever flavor there is in here; best to stick with the original Japanese dialogue & subtitles if you want to give it a chance.

WATCH THIS, NOT THAT/LINK:  Legendary Ghibli Studio founder/animator Hayao Miyazaki gave the order to reuse some characters from the superior WHISPER OF THE HEART/’95 in here. https://maksquibs.blogspot.com/2015/05/mimi-wo-sumaseba-whisper-of-heart-1995.html

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