As you may or may not have noticed, we skipped a day. There was a family emergency (everyone and everything is fine now, so don't worry) that took us out of the house for the whole evening, so we had no time to watch anything.
But today, we watched Howl's Moving Castle. We had both seen it before independently of each other, but only once when it first came out and neither one of us could remember anything until it actually happened, so it was like watching it for the first time.
I do remember being somewhat disappointed when I first watched it, like too many things were left unexplained. I also remember reading the book it's based on immediately after and liking that a whole lot more (though I don't remember any of it anymore either).
On this second viewing, I looked for a theme, something that could tie the various disparate threads of the movie together. The first thread is the antagonism between Howl and the Witch of the Waste, which Sophie inadvertently gets in the middle of, and gets turned into an old woman for her trouble. The second thread is Sophie's journey to become young again, and how that takes her to the titular castle. The third thread is the war between two unnamed nations, and the destruction that is wreaking everywhere they meet. The fourth and final thread is Howl's own journey, though I have to admit this is the thread that is most hurt by various cuts Miyazaki had to make to fit the novel into a two-hour animated feature.
While these four threads crisscross each other, they honestly seem to have little in common beyond Howl himself. The Witch of the Waste is ultimately taken care of by Howl's old teacher, Suliman (and that name could be an essay all by itself), at which point Howl and Sophie rescue the Witch and their antagonism is never mentioned again. The war ultimately ends because Suliman saw Howl and Sophie's happy ending thanks to Heen (the most ridiculous-looking dog in all of Studio Ghibli), and she decides now's a good time to stop it... which makes no sense? Howl's journey... yeah, I don't know. There's a black room that leads to his childhood (literally; Sophie uses the black room to go to the past at one point), and he made a bargain with the demon Calcifer, but none of it makes any real sense as presented. The most fleshed-out thread is Sophie's journey, which is basically a love story. That's not bad or anything, but you can easily see where it's going a mile away.
So, what was the unifying theme? I'd like to think it was forgiveness. It explains almost every ultimate action by pretty much every character in the film. The war between the two nations may have been engineered by Suliman so she could find Howl and punish him for leaving her, but when she saw how happy he was with Sophie, she forgave him and stopped the war. The Witch forgives Howl for whatever injustice he wrought on her (he likely spurned her at one point or another, as she really wanted his heart, both literally and symbolically) when she gives his heart to Sophie (both literally and symbolically) so Sophie can save him. Calcifer and Howl forgive each other and undo the pact they made so long ago. And Sophie basically forgives everyone: the Witch, Calcifer, Suliman and her war, her mother (who is a fleeting presence at best), and Howl.
I could be wrong. Maybe forgiveness has nothing to do with this movie. Maybe it's about being brave and confident, which is supported by how Sophie's transformation comes and goes depending on her actions. Maybe it's love, and how that transcends our sometimes monstrous actions. Maybe it's something else entirely. But I think forgiveness fits best, and ties an otherwise truncated and disparate story together, papering over its many plot holes.
So, I forgive this movie for not being all it could be, and I will love it on its own terms.
PS. Seriously though, read the book by Diana Wynne Jones. I remember it being much better š
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