Napier's Anime Summary
In Napier's book, Anime: from Akira to Howl's Moving Castle, she addressed several motifs: Identity, feminine characters, and narrative making. The articles in the book stated analysis with various films as instances. The first part of the book explored the relationship between global and local (Japanese) society and animation. In this book, Japanese animation is both the media and the culture container. It is the media that communicate contemporary values with the audience. It also is the container that accumulates national and worldwide cultures and tries to create something new. In the second part, Napier analyzed some animation masterpieces related to identity reorganization. For instance, she discussed three animations in chapter five, Ghost and Machines: the technological body. What she stated is the contradiction between the hard machine bodies and the vulnerable human bodies inside the machine. The machine bodies are so much stronger than human bodies. But eventually, what would last forever is not the body but the soul and spirit. In the last part, Napier talked about the influence of historical background on the creation of animation. What impressed me is chapter 11. Napier analyzed the impact of the World War II. The war took away lives and prosperity. What were left are
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They have unique experiences. But they are often in the same identity with other characters in the animation. In Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind, Nausicaä is the princess of the Valley of the Wind. She is one of the members in the kingdom. In Laputa, Sheeta is an ordinary girl as well. The classic shojo, however, usually are action heroes or extremely but secretly different with others. Many of them, like in Sailor Moon, are girls with magic. Same instances include Cardcaptor Sakura and Mysterious Thief Saint Tail. Their behavior consists of various forms of violent retribution toward
They have unique experiences. But they are often in the same identity with other characters in the animation. In Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind, Nausicaä is the princess of the Valley of the Wind. She is one of the members in the kingdom. In Laputa, Sheeta is an ordinary girl as well. The classic shojo, however, usually are action heroes or extremely but secretly different with others. Many of them, like in Sailor Moon, are girls with magic. Same instances include Cardcaptor Sakura and Mysterious Thief Saint Tail. Their behavior consists of various forms of violent retribution toward