After having milked the Studio Ghibli library dry (my favorites remain Whisper of the Heart, Pom Poko, My Neighbors Yamada, and Spirited Away), we’ve come back to exploring domestic fare.
Of those that we’ve seen recently, Coco and Wreck it Ralph have stood out because because they are more than their premises. It’s more than just “a boy’s hijinks in the world of the undead,” or “what if arcade characters had their own lives off-hours”.
Like any popular film, these movies have both contain rollicking wild stories, but they also go deeper, genuinely touching on kernels of family and belonging.
We’ve already watched both of these movies a couple times, and I’ll be curious if they hold up in a few years when the boy grows up and we get to watch them anew.