clew's reviews: a book log

Howl's Moving Castle, Diana Wynne Jones

... speaking of the Brontës; I'm not sure whether the Miyazaki movie or the original best rings the Jane Eyre bell.

The characters don't change as much in the movie, and it certainly isn't as puzzle-box-like as the book. I missed Sophie's growing up as Jane Eyre did, although the visual variation of the spell on Sophie was terrifically clever and at least as informative as prose about it. On the other hand, the Miyazaki Howl has all the blinded romantic hero glamour; Jones' (query: Jones or Wynne Jones?) is a regular guy, although clever and likeable.

War stuff in the movie, thrillingly creepy; on the other hand, why no Wales? I was really looking forward to

• hearing the saucepan song (in Welsh), which should sound foreign in either English or Japanese so wouldn't need translation, except
• perhaps it would need to be translated for the Welsh version of the movie, should there be such a thing.

On the whole, I think the movie did a decent job of telling a slightly different story with pretty much the same characters, so that one can enjoy them in either order without feeling betrayed that something fundamental has been changed. The movie is prettier; the book is smarter.

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