Although Hayao Miyazaki’s anime films for Studio Ghibli give me the ick, with their nightmare tweeness and yowling urchins, this faithful adaptation of his 2001 hit is superbly done.
Live action, music and bewitching bunraku puppets – created by Toby ‘War Horse’ Olié – combine in John Caird’s production to replicate the film’s baffling dream logic, where a young girl battles adversity in the spirit world, finds love and saves her parents.
