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American bombers dump napalm canisters on Japanese cities during the closing stages of World War II, setting off firestorms. These bombs, which are about the same size all around and are slightly longer than a tin can, drop to the ground while leaving behind fluttering fabric tails. After they strike, there is a brief period of stillness before they explode, dousing their surroundings in flames. There is no means to put out fires in a Japanese residential neighborhood made up of frail wood and paper houses.
An cartoon movie from 1988 called “Grave of the Fireflies” tells the tale of two Kobe, Japan, children who were displaced by bombings. Seita is a juvenile adolescent, and Setsuko is about five years old. Seita kneels next to her body, which is covered in burns in an emergency hospital, as their mother, a bomb victim, lies beside them. Their father is a member of the Japanese military. Their house, their friends, and their institutions are all gone. After a while, Seita discovers them a hillside cave where they can live after an aunt temporarily takes them in but is cruel about the need to feed them. He makes an effort to locate food and respond to Setsuko’s inquiries regarding their parents. We know Setsuko’s destiny because the opening shot of the movie reveals Seita dead in a subway station; the boy’s spirit guides us through flashbacks.
The emotional impact of “Grave of the Fireflies” is so strong that it makes viewers reconsider animation. Since the earliest days, most animated pictures have been “cartoons” for children and families. Recent animated films like “The Lion King,” “Princess Mononoke,” and “The Iron Giant” have dealt with more somber subjects, and “Toy Story” pictures and beloved animated classics like “Bambi” have had their share of emotional high points. These movies, however, take place in a secure environment; they bring about tears but not sorrow. I understand what reviewer Ernest Rister means when he compares “Grave of the Fireflies” to “Schindler’s List” and claims that it is “the most profoundly human animated film I’ve ever seen” because it is a potent drama that also happens to be animated.
It recounts a straightforward tale of survival. The young boy and his sister need to locate lodging and food. Their family members are not kind or generous during a conflict, and after their aunt sells their mother’s kimonos for rice, she hoards a large portion of the proceeds for herself. Seita eventually decides it’s time to go. He can buy food because he has some money, but shortly there won’t be any left to buy. His sibling loses strength. In the neorealist style, their story is told simply and directly rather than as melodrama. There is also time for stillness. One of the film’s biggest strengths is its patience; shots are held to allow us time to process them, characters are only glimpsed in secret, and the environment is given space to establish itself.
The great filmmaker Yasujiro Ozu used “pillow shots”—a small detail from nature, for example—to break up scenes in his films. Pillow words are pauses that fall somewhere between punctuation and pauses used by Japanese poets. They’re used in “Grave of the Fireflies,” too. Its images produce a form of lyricism. There are some fast-paced scenes, like when the bombs start dropping and the streets are filled with frightened people, but this movie doesn’t rely on the action for its plot; instead, it ponders its effects.
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Isao Takahata, a director affiliated with the renowned Ghibli Studio, the creator of the best Japanese animation, directed the movie. His partner there is Hayao Miyazaki (“Princess Mononoke,” “Kiki’s Delivery Service,” “My Neighbor Totoro”). His movies aren’t typically this somber, but “Grave of the Fireflies” stands out on its own. It is based on a novel by Nosaka Akiyuki, who was a child when the firebombs occurred, whose sister did pass away from hunger, and whose life has been marred by guilt.
Since the book is well-known in Japan, a live-action movie could easily have been influenced by it. It isn’t the usual cartoon content. For “Grave of the Fireflies,” however, I believe animation was the best option. The weight of the action, brutality, and special effects would have weighed heavily on live action. Takahata can focus on the core of the narrative thanks to animation, and the absence of visual realism in his animated characters encourages more imaginative play on our part. Without the literal presence of real actors, we are better able to associate the characters with our own associations.
Even though “realistic animation” is a misnomer, Hollywood animation has long sought to achieve it. People in drawings do not resemble those in photographs. They can convey mood through body language because their movements are more exaggerated and more clearly symbolic, as Disney painstakingly tested. Despite not attempting to be as realistic as “The Lion King” or “Princess Mononoke,” “Grave of the Fireflies” is, ironically, the most emotionally authentic animated movie I’ve ever seen.
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The places and backgrounds are drawn in a manner resembling that of contemporary artist Herge and Japanese artist Hiroshige from the 18th century. (the creator of Tin Tin). They are incredibly beautiful, but it is not the beauty of a cartoon; rather, it is the beauty of an animated drawing of an evocative environment. With their enormous eyes, childlike bodies, and highly malleable features (mouths are tiny when closed but immense when opened in a child’s cry—we even see Setsuko’s tonsils), the characters are representative of much contemporary Japanese animation. If it needed proving, this movie does it. Animation creates emotional effects by heightening and simplifying reality instead of replicating it, which is why many of the sequences are about concepts rather than actual experiences.
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There are isolated instances of outstanding loveliness. One describes a night when the kids capture fireflies and light up their cave with them. The following day, Seita discovers his younger sister carefully burying the deceased insects, just as she had imagined burying her mother. In another scene, the girl uses mud to create “rice balls” and other fictitious foods as she “prepares dinner” for her sibling. Also take notice of the timing and use of silence in a scene where they discover a dead corpse on the beach, followed by the appearance of additional bombers in the distance.
Another image is highlighted by Rister: “There’s a moment where the boy Seita traps an air bubble with a washrag, submerges it, and then releases it into his sister Setsuko’s delighted face—and that’s when I knew I was witnessing something special.
“Grave of the Fireflies” is influenced by long-standing Japanese cultural currents, as described by critic Dennis H. Fukushima Jr., who locates the play’s roots in the double-suicide play tradition. Seita and Setsuko don’t openly commit suicide; rather, existence saps their will to live. He also makes a comparison between hillside graves and their cave of safety.
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Fukushima quotes an encounter with the author, Akiyuki, saying that because he was the only person to survive, he felt responsible for his sister’s passing. He frequently fed himself first and his sibling second while foraging for food. Hunger was her undeniable cause of death, and Nosaka would be haunted by this tragic truth for many years. He was inspired to write about it in an effort to exorcise the demons that had been plaguing him.
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The cartoon Japanese film “Grave of the Fireflies” has not received much attention. Nobody takes anime aficionados seriously when they praise the movie. Perhaps now that it’s available on DVD and has the option of English dubbing or subtitles, it will receive the notice it merits. Even though it’s a cartoon and the children have saucer-shaped eyes, it should be included on any list of the best war movies ever produced.
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