The Boy and the Heron opens with a sharp wail of a siren — something has gone wrong, something bad. A fire rages in Tokyo and men are pouring out into the streets to help put it out. The film’s protagonist, Mahito, rushes to get dressed and sprints into the chaos. All we hear is his breath, panting and shaking, as he arrives to see a hospital collapse into a pool of flames. Hayao Miyazaki’s film cuts abruptly to a parade of tanks rolling down the street, and the piano enters, plaintive, mournful, and almost welcoming.
On January 23, Miyazaki received his fourth nomination for the semiautobiographical The Boy and the Heron for Best Animated Feature: a category in which he previously won for 2001’s Spirited Away and was otherwise nominated for Howl’s Moving Castle (2004) and The Wind…
