Source: @NetEase Game Channel column

Anyone who is familiar with the master Miyazaki will not be surprised that he has repeatedly said that he has retired, but has repeatedly returned.

Earlier this month, the Oscars officially awarded Miyazaki the Lifetime Achievement Award, and in an interview after the ceremony, the animation master, who announced his third retirement a year ago, said that he will continue to work in the future. For him, at least, the Lifetime Achievement Award doesn't mean it's time to say goodbye once and for all, and those familiar with Miyazaki's career won't be surprised.

An unexpected change in the succession

The first time Miyazaki officially announced his retirement in his career was after the filming of "Princess Mononoke" was completed in 1997, when the 56-year-old Miyazaki first said in public, "This is my last work".

In fact, if you are serious, he has expressed similar thoughts at least twice before. Once in 1986, the box office of "Castle in the Sky" did not meet expectations, and Miyazaki, who was in his prime, talked about the possibility that he might retire because of this. The other time was in 1992, after completing "Porco Rosso", which he wanted to express the most at the time, Hayao Miyazaki, who was praised by the outside world, said that his animation career could be over. However, compared with the official statement in 97, the previous two times were more like casually expressing their feelings, and no one took it seriously and finally failed to come true.

As for "Princess Mononoke", a masterpiece that took Hayao Miyazaki 16 years to conceive, a three-year system, and Ghibli made the most money on record, the achievement is also staggering. In the end, with a score of 19.3 billion yen, it broke the previous Japanese box office record held by "E.T the Extra-Terrestrial" for 15 years, and perfectly expressed Miyazaki's long-standing worldview in terms of plot and concept. If you can use such a fame and fortune and acclaimed work as your own work, it should be a beautiful talk, and Miyazaki at that time was already sick and insisted on working in the later stage of "Princess Mononoke" because of years of hard work. Under the combined influence of these factors, he had the idea of retreating this time.

At the time, the Japanese industry was shocked and regretted, after all, 56 years old is far from retirement age for animation directors, and many people also thought that Miyazaki's retirement should be a temporary break for a few years, and then he should still be involved in related work - it turned out that they were completely right. In January 1998, Miyazaki left Ghibli, but in the same year he continued to produce short films in his studio "Ermali", which was equivalent to withdrawing his retirement declaration in disguise, and he has returned to Ghibli since 1999 to continue as director.

There are different theories about the causes and consequences of Miyazaki's first retirement and then comeback, but one of the most influential variables is generally considered to be the untimely death of Miyazaki's chosen successor, Kifumi Kondo. As a disciple of Hayao Miyazaki and Isao Takahata, the late bloomer Kondo absorbed the strengths of both, and was Miyazaki's best successor in terms of style and philosophy, and after his first work "Listen Closely" was recognized in 1995, Kondo was already regarded as a core member of Ghibli and the future head of Ghibli. At the end of 1997, Kondo was urgently admitted to the hospital for dissociative aortic aneurysm, and died on January 21, 1998 at the age of 47.

In his eulogy at Kondo's funeral, Hayao Miyazaki lamented, "In this industry, we are all constantly wearing ourselves down, only taking a short break after success, and then continuing to work." And I thought he would be able to come back as usual this time." Perhaps it was because of the sudden fall of Kondo that Miyazaki finally made the decision to retire, but in hindsight, it was precisely because of Kondo's sudden departure that Miyazaki finally chose to return to Ghibli, and also missed the best opportunity to pass it on to the next generation, so he had to continue to carry it on his own in the years to come. It is also destined to be difficult to completely draw an end to his creative career in the next ten years.

The failure of "The Battle of the Earth and the Sea".

Miyazaki's second retirement is actually not as clear as the first, and the more accurate time point was initially after Howl's Moving Castle in 2004, when he once again said that "I have lost my passion for making zuò animation".

Compared with seven years ago, Miyazaki is not only seven years older at this time, but has also climbed to a new peak in his career. In 1999, "Yamada-kun Neighbor" was unsatisfactory, and while people called for Miyazaki to save Ghibli, they were somewhat skeptical that he could continue to be magical. But 2001's "Spirited Away's Hide" once again proved that only Miyazaki can surpass Miyazaki himself. After its release, this work regained the Japanese box office record previously set by "Titanic" with 30.4 billion yen, and the ratings in the Kanto and Kansai regions were close to 50% when it was broadcast on TV stations, and won the Golden Bear Award at the Berlin International Film Festival and the Oscar for Best Animated Feature Film, becoming Miyazaki's highest honor recognized worldwide, leaving his name forever in the film history of Japan and even the world's animation. Spirited Away's Hidden Spirits is undoubtedly more qualified to say so.

In 2004, "Howl's Moving Castle" once again surpassed her "Princess Mononoke" with a box office of 19.6 billion yen. Ranked among the top five in Japanese film history at the time, Miyazaki also proved that he could not only express Japanese-style works, but also achieve breakthroughs in adapting Western literature. He then began to express his willingness to retire in concrete terms, reducing his involvement in Ghibli's internal work and encouraging the promotion of new people.

But during this period, due to a series of decision-making influences, Ghibli, who should have reached his peak, ushered in another turning point, because Miyazaki's eldest son, Goro Miyazaki, took over the adaptation of the animation of "Battle of the Earth". As early as 2003, with the worldwide success of "Spirited Away's Shinto", the original author Ursula Legine and Ghibli agreed on the adaptation, but then Ghibli's animation producer Toshio Suzuki unexpectedly used Goro Miyazaki, who had no experience in animation and film-related production at the time, to take over the work, and immediately after the announcement, it attracted doubts from all sides, including Hayao Miyazaki himself was not optimistic about its prospects and asked for a replacement many times, but in the end, Goro Miyazaki directed this "" for the first time "The Battle of the Earth and the Sea" was released as scheduled in 2006.

"The Battle of the Earth and the Sea" bears the double signature of Ghibli and Miyazaki, but the final result can only be said to be a barely passing Cheng dù, with a box office of 7.6 billion yen ranking last among Ghibli's previous works, and the media has almost one-sided criticism of it, and the original author Ursula also expressed her dissatisfaction with this, believing that Ghibli has failed to live up to her expectations. Industry insiders believe that this result is not only the responsibility of Goro Miyazaki, but also Ghibli, who reluctantly pushed it to the forefront, should be even more responsible. Hayao Miyazaki, who had already planned to fade out of the front line, had to direct the next work again, and in 2008 he released "The Goldfish Princess on the Cliff", which was largely done to prove that the Ghibli signature was still standing, and after that, Miyazaki once again expressed his intention of retiring to Toshio Suzuki internally.

Ghibli's road of no return

On September 2, 2013, at the press conference of the 70th Venice Film Festival for the first time in five years, the chairman and spokesman of Studio Ghibli, Koji Hoshino, announced Miyazaki's third retirement statement.

This news immediately became the headlines of major websites, and at the official retirement public press conference on September 6, Miyazaki himself admitted that it was indeed time to say goodbye this time, but just like the story of "the wolf came", the first thought of everyone who heard the news in private was mostly "Anyway, this time it's just talking" - and as everyone estimated, soon the news of the third retirement added some additional conditions, such as Miyazaki Hayao soon added that it was not a complete retreat, I will also make some short works that I want; For example, at the beginning of this year, Ghibli hinted that the possibility of Hayao Miyazaki's voluntary assistance in some work would not be ruled out in the future; Even his long-time friend Takahata Xun didn't give much face, and immediately debunked it: "He says it is serious every time, but it is easy to regret it, and I am not surprised at all when he will come back." ”

Different people also have different opinions on Miyazaki's repeated "backsliding", some people think it is a desire to create, some people think it is the pursuit of fame and fortune, and some people even maliciously speculate that this is tantamount to hype. In 1998, Miyazaki retired for the first time and returned, and in the year when Ghibli lost his most promising successor, Kondo Yoshifumi, Ghibli has embarked on a road of no return.

Ghibli was founded on the basis that, as Toshio Suzuki admitted, it was born so that those who were chasing their dreams could create animation freely. But when Ghibli gained fame and fortune, became a regular brand and became a brand, it was no longer a pure name and carried the future of a group of people. After becoming a joint-stock company that needs to take operational risks in 2005, it is necessary to rely on the box office income of each work to make the organization operate normally, and every time the profit is paid for these years, it is necessary to start the budget for the next production system, and a slight failure may fall into a financial crisis, and Ghibli's relatively traditional workshop-style operation, adopting the practice of employing full-time employees and never outsourcing has made the burden even heavier, which is also the reason why Miyazaki has not been able to leave completely and has repeatedly come out to fight fires.

Miyazaki's Ghibli left too many traces of his own, objectively casting this golden signboard but also limiting other possibilities, Mochizuki Tomomitsu, Hosoda Mamoru these people are not without talent, but in the end they can't leave their own color in Ghibli, so that the era of ** Sakya has fallen into an unsolvable cycle, because it is difficult for newcomers to be heavy responsibilities and must rely on Miyazaki, because it is difficult to rely on Miyazaki and it is difficult for newcomers to take on heavy responsibilities, more than ten years have passed in a blink of an eye, At the age of 73, Miyazaki remains a physical force to Ghibli, not a spiritual leader, and even if he repeatedly postpones his retirement plans, the curtain will eventually come to an end. Since the beginning of this year, Ghibli has repeatedly rumored that it will discontinue animation production and transfer to the copyright management of existing works, and has now terminated the employee contract of the animation department, with the release of the last work "Marnie in Memory", the future of Ghibli animation may really only become a term of the past.

If the final answer is really as everyone expected, Ghibli will fall silent with the old man's fading, it is also a result that has to be accepted, from "My Neighbor Totoro" to "Castle in the Sky", from "Princess Mononoke" to "Spirited Away's Hide", from "Howl's Moving Castle" to "Princess Goldfish on the Cliff", this eccentric master who wrote his name into the annals of Japanese animation has built too many legends, whether "The Wind Rises" or his last performance, we should understand the answer he chose next, Because he is qualified to be capricious.