Ponyo (Gake no ue no Ponyo/Ponyo A Cliff By The Sea) (2008)

Hayao Miyazaki's latest film, Ponyo, is an animated maritime fantasy centered on the curiosity and courage of a five-year-old boy named Sosuke (pronounced Sahs-kay, voiced by Frankie Jonas). He lives atop a coastal slope in Japan from where his mother drives like a banshee down the mountain road and across the ship channel to take him to school next to the hospice where she works. His father is a ship's officer who takes an extra shift but flashes semaphores with his son as his ship passes by. ("Is mom mad at me?" is a humorous three-way exchange.) They are a close-knit and resourceful family and, no doubt as a result, Sosuke is older and wiser than his years. While playing on the shore, Sosuke meets the tiny sea creature Ponyo (voiced by Noah Cyrus), who happens to taste a drop of human blood from a cut in the boy's hand, which causes her to begin a magical transformation that has been long feared by her father (voice of Liam Neeson) but is ultimately met calmly by her mother (voice of Cate Blanchett). Their true natures are gradually revealed as the story progresses and I won't give any of their secrets away. Ponyo's destiny is at stake, however, as well as the whole world's. Calamity falls on the coastal lands as Ponyo's transformed nature reveals itself with salvific and even redemptive overtones. The animation in Ponyo reaches a joyous climax and the story is positively uplifting. My youngest son wants us to own the disc when it comes out and so do I. 5 stars.