Kondō also amplifies sounds like the creaking of doors or chairs, making each resound clearly and precisely, and when Seiji accompanies Shizuku home one night, the soundtrack’s twinkling music competes with the gently rhythmic sound of the rotating wheels of Seiji’s bicycle as he walks it alongside Shizuku. In one scene, during a rainstorm, Kondō delights in using the rain’s patter as the moody backdrop for a particularly emotional conversation between the protagonist Shizuku (Yōko Honna) and her love interest Seiji (Issei Takahashi). Outside, we hear insects and birds or the distant but soft noise of human voices and traffic. Kondō brings his world to life aurally rather than merely visually: throughout Whisper of the Heart, ambient and environmental sounds rise to the foreground and vividly conjure up distinct locations. By contrast, Kondō’s world is one of crystalline stillness, each movement resounding with sharp clarity. We may notice the meticulously detailed movement of clothing or the independence with which the natural world moves apart from the concerns of humans. In Miyazaki’s films, each image seems positively alive, tempting us to linger over them like paintings. The difference between the two is readily apparent when we examine how they construct their worlds. This is not to criticize Miyazaki’s films but to suggest that his ambition and distinct brand of genius precluded him from paring his stories down to the spare beauty of Whisper of the Heart.
And in Kiki’s Delivery Service, a film which shares many of the concerns of Whisper of the Heart, what we remember about Kiki is her ability to fly through the air. In retrospect, it is the magnificent, unforgettable Totoro that we remember most about My Neighbor Totoro, not the two sisters. What Kondō does instead is zoom in on one element of Studio Ghibli’s work and amplify it, pushing everything else to the side in order to eliminate any distractions: Miyazaki’s work has always been attentive to the state of mind of young people, especially young girls-his earlier films My Neighbor Totoro and Kiki’s Delivery Service being masterful examples of that-but very often, our attention is pulled in so many other directions within magical, otherworldly settings. This is a firmly realistic film, and the closest we come to Miyazaki’s trademark supernaturalism is in a sequence clearly demarcated as being part of the protagonist’s imagination. One of the reasons Whisper of the Heart feels so much like Kondō’s work, despite Miyazaki’s significant involvement in the film, is that, unlike the work of Miyazaki, there is no supernatural element in the film whatsoever. Experiencing the film, it’s hard not to believe that Kondō would have gone on to have a long, great career as a director. All we can do is speculate from the work we do have, but even within Ghibli’s tremendous body of work, Whisper of the Heart is a special film, one that perfectly captures the emotional life of a young, introverted girl. Despite this, the film seems clearly the work of a different artist, markedly different from Miyazaki’s work, and it is this fact that amplifies the tragedy of Kondō’s early death. Miyazaki’s presence is felt throughout Studio Ghibli’s work, and in fact, he drew storyboards and wrote the screenplay for Whisper of the Heart, adapted from the manga of the same name by Aoi Hiiragi. Studio Ghibli is today most associated with its co-founder Hayao Miyazaki, perhaps the greatest director of animated films of his time. Three years later, Kondō passed away suddenly at the relatively young age of 47, depriving the world of a promising, hardworking artist-Kondō had a hand in a number of major Ghibli productions before directing a feature. In 1995, Studio Ghibli released Whisper of the Heart, the first and only feature film directed by animator Yoshifumi Kondō.
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Rediscover is a series of reviews highlighting past releases that have flown under the radar and now deserve a second look.