A real-life lantern festival transports attendees to Studio Ghibli’s Spirited Away.
As reported by SoraNews24, Nagasaki, Japan, will hold its annual Lantern Festival throughout the first 15 days of the Lunar New Year. A reporter for the outlet recommends the Tojin Grounds in Nagasaki City’s Chinatown area as the best location to view the spectacular event. Surrounded by walls, the Tojin Grounds was once a Chinese settlement from 1639 to 1853. With over 15,000 lanterns, the Nagasaki festival resembles a scene straight out of Studio Ghibli’s Spirited Away.
The Magic of Studio Ghibli’s Spirited Away
Released in 2001, Spirited Away became the first hand-drawn and non-English-language film to win the Academy Award for Best Animated Feature. Hayao Miyazaki’s movie follows 10-year-old Chihiro Ogino through a mysterious land following her parents’ transformation into pigs. Seeking shelter at a gigantic bathhouse, Chihiro encounters dangers and allies among the resident spirits as she works up the courage to escape to her own home.
While Spirited Away remains a staple in Studio Ghibli’s film catalog, Miyazaki has created numerous successful films since its premiere date. The animation studio recently announced that the director’s final film, tentatively titled How Do You Live?, would release in Japanese cinemas on July 14, 2023, though no announcement has been made regarding its release in other countries.
Studio Ghibli opened Ghibli Park in November, two years behind its projected schedule. Outside Nagoya, Japan, Aichi Expo Memorial Park houses the 17.5-acre site. On Jan. 10, Ghibli Park officially extended ticket sales to fans other than Japanese residents. Previously, scalpers resold tickets for over 2,000% of their original price. In response, Hideaki Omura, governor of the Aichi Prefecture, disapproved of the scalping. “It is not ideal for tickets to be bought just to be resold at a premium. I hope people refrain from doing things like this.”
Currently, the Dondoko Forest, Ghibli’s Grand Warehouse and the Hill of Youth areas make up the park’s first phase of locations based on Miyazaki’s film credits. In Dondoko forest, visitors can walk through Satsuki and Mei’s house from My Neighbor Totoro. Other Ghibli-themed places include the antique shop from Whisper of the Heart, Yubaba’s office from Spirited Away and an elevator tower inspired by Laputa: Castle in the Sky. Apart from the first phase’s attractions, Ghibli Park plans to open the Mononoke Forest area and the Valley of the Witches in late 2023 and March 2024, respectively.
Much of Studio Ghibli’s film library is available to stream on HBO Max.
Source: SoraNews24
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