Ponyo on the Cliff by the Sea

I recently re-watched Ponyo on the Cliff beside the Sea. It’s such a sweet movie I just had to watch it again to try and cheer myself up. When I found out it was a sort of version of The Little Mermaid, I was surprised at first, but then I could see the similarities. There are of course also details that I imagine are based on Japanese culture, but also apparently references to Richard Wagner’s series of operas about the Ring des NIbelungen.

For anyone who hasn’t seen it, it’s a movie about a little boy who lives on a cliff beside the sea (his father is a sailor). The little boy finds an unusual fish down by the sea shore and wants to bring it to his daycare center. He names the fish Ponyo, not knowing that Ponyo is really the daughter of a wizard and a sea goddess and her real name is Brunhilde. The wizard used to be a human but has retreated to the sea in disgust over how humans are treating the world. Ponyo, who ended up on the shore in the first place because she’s the most adventurous of all her hundreds of siblings (sisters?), immediately becomes fond of the little boy, Sosuke. She decides she wants to stay with him and become a human. Her father doesn’t like that at all, and her escape causes a tsunami. LIke the little mermaid, Ponyo risks turning into sea foam if Sosuke (a five-year-old boy!) betrays her.

I love this movie, it’s so sweet and cheerful and I like the underlying message too (if I’ve understood it correctly?). Some things confused me though. This movie has been translated from Japanese into English and, I imagine, then from English into Swedish. Some things might have been lost on the way. Of course it is still possible someone translated directly into Swedish from the original Japanese, but I doubt it. There were too many inconsistencies. For instance, the voices and the subtitles didn’t match at all.

One thing I was wondering about was why Sosuke calls his parents by their first names. Why is a Japanese mother named Lisa? Also, no one seems particularly surprised about a five-year-old girl showing up straight out of the sea and telling them she used to be a fish and about her wizard father and sea goddess mother. Still, the overall impression is just beautiful and the movie is very skillfully done.