‘Spirited Away’ is the only anime film that has managed to get the Oscar for Best Animated Film since the category exists. And despite the importance of these awards, the legendary director Hayao Miyazaki refused to attend the ceremony as a protest against the war in Iraq.
Miyazaki’s historic protest
The Oscar ceremony usually has its moments for political messages, either in support of minorities and more disadvantaged groups or to criticize the current ruler. Rare is the year that there is no controversy, although this year criticism of the ‘Don’t Say Gay’ legislation in Florida and support for Ukraine have ended up being overshadowed by El Sopapo.
This year there were several moments to remember the invasion of Ukraine (including a written message followed by an announcement of cryptocurrencies that left a certain cyberpunk aftertaste to the situation), but it is certainly not the first time that during the Oscar ceremony there has been a protest against a war. In fact, Hayao Miyazaki already made his own personal boycott of the gala back in 2003 to protest the US invasion of Iraq.
‘Spirited Away’ had been released in the United States in September 2002 and quickly became a mass phenomenon, a modern classic that won over critics and the box office and earned Miyazaki his first animation Oscar nomination. On March 23, 2003, the movie Studio Ghibli was crowned the best animated film of the year, also going down in history as the only anime film that has achieved the statuette so far… But when it was the director’s turn to take the stage for his award, Turns out he wasn’t anywhere.
“They looked for Miyazaki to go upstairs to accept the award… but the director was not present in the room,” The Japan Times reported at the time.
After a few initial moments of confusion, Ghibli apologized to the Academy saying that Miyazaki was very busy working on his new movie. But what actually happened is that the director had directly refused to travel to the United States by his own principles, since he was very furious with the invasion of Iraq.
“I felt immense rage”Miyazaki recalled years later in his memoirs. Although initially the producer Toshio Suzuki managed to silence any controversy, but finally Miyazaki released his own statement on the matter.
“It is unfortunate that I cannot wholeheartedly rejoice in this award because of the deeply sad events that are happening in the world,” Miyazaki said. “However, I would like to sincerely thank all my friends who have worked so hard to get ‘Spirited Away’ released in the US, and everyone who has shown their appreciation for the film.”
war as inspiration
The director tried to stay as far from the press as possible, with Studio Ghibli headquarters being constantly surrounded by journalists after winning the Oscar. In the end, Suzuki organized a press conference to explain the situation again, although Miyazaki was again absent.
“It’s just that I couldn’t stand that his smiling face is everywhere”, said the producer about Miyazaki, although the reality was that the director refused to make a show of it with the press. Instead he decided to focus on his next creation, with the Iraq war being one of the great inspirations for ‘Howl’s Moving Castle’.
Miyazaki already did not care how this felt beyond Japan, and even went so far as to tell a Japanese newspaper that he had done “a very conscious effort to create a film that wasn’t too successful in America”. taking base the Diana Wynne-Jones bookMiyazaki created a film protesting the war that ended up becoming one of the studio’s great classics.
“The world is changing tremendously… Under these circumstances, you have to produce movies that are consistent with the times, movies that ask the right questions and give the right answers to the audience, and also give them hope,” Miyazaki said of ‘ Howl’s Moving Castle. “As you can imagine, this is a somewhat pretentious objective and also very complicated.”
Although Miyazaki wanted to criticize the political stance of the United States and that his film did not do well, ‘Howl’s Moving Castle’ ended up being a success in the country. In fact, it earned him his next Oscar nomination in 2006, although he ultimately lost to ‘Wallace and Gromit: The Curse of the Vegetables’.