The Secret World of Arrietty (Kari-gurashi no Arietti, 2010) by Hayao Miyazaki

Post By: Dallin Jack

            The Secret World of Arrietty, an animated film adaptation of The Borrowers by Mary Norton, is a Japanese take on an English children’s novel. Miyazaki does a brilliant job in giving this story a Japanese flavor, even though the original The Borrowers is set in Great Britain.  Through cinematic and narrative devices, Miyazaki portrays the story of a young girl reaching maturity and her struggle to survive in an ever-changing world. Through looking at the interactions between two different societies, Miyazaki is able to comment on the flaws of an isolationistic philosophy while telling a coming-of-age story.

            The film opens on Sho, a sickly boy, riding to his great aunt’s house to relax because of a heart condition. As he arrives, he briefly glimpses a tiny person who we find out is Arrietty, a “Borrower” who lives with her parents in a tiny house underneath the human house. Arrietty is almost fourteen, so her father takes her on her first “borrowing,” where they take things they need from the human house. While trying to get tissues, Sho sees Arrietty again. He tries to talk to her, but she and her father run home. The family talks of leaving the house because they have been discovered.

Sho tries to meet Arrietty by giving her the sugar cube she had dropped during the borrowing. Ignoring her father’s warnings, Arrietty takes the sugar cube and returns it to Sho. She tells him that they do not need his help and to leave them alone, but as they talk they become friends.

            When the aunt leaves the house one day, the caretaker Haru calls the exterminators to catch the Borrowers, which she has known about for some time. She finds the Borrowers’ house and kidnaps Arrietty’s mother. Arrietty frees her mother with Sho’s help, and the aunt returns and sends the exterminators away.

            As the family is leaving for a new home, Sho finds Arrietty with the help of the cat and they get to say goodbye. The film ends as the family floats down the river in a teapot.

            The Secret World of Arrietty, as an animated film, uses the medium of animation to show things which couldn’t be done well in a typical live action film. The size difference between Arrietty and Sho is easy to animate, but would be difficult to show with real actors. Many live action movies overcome this issue by using strategic camera angles, specific composition, and other effects to show giants or small people, but much of the action in Arrietty involves direct interactions between Arrietty and Sho that would be hard to do even with those effects. On top of that, there are multiple animals and insects in the film that chase or attack the Borrowers. Even CGI would make these parts of the movie seem strange if it were live action. In one particular scene, an angry crow dives into the window of Sho’s room while Arrietty is on the windowsill. 

  The crow thrashes about and then leaves when Haru hits it with her shoe. If this were live action, the whole scene would seem ridiculous and cruel to the crow, but the fact that it is animation allows the viewer to recognize that the animals and characters in the movie aren’t real, and that lets us be okay with more out-of-the-ordinary things happening.

            The film, though based on a series of British novels, gives a distinct Japanese taste to the story. In the opening scene where Sho is in the car, we see that the license plate is Japanese (it says多摩). When the humans eat their meals, they eat Japanese meals with traditional rice bowls. These subtle inclusions give the film a Japanese feel. On a larger scale, the film may be an allegory of Japanese isolationism. Even though Sho and the aunt have done many things to try to befriend the Borrowers, they largely stick to themselves. They never use the dollhouse that was made specifically for Borrowers like them, and in the end, they move to another house simply because they have been discovered, even though the humans (with the exception of Haru) would be willing to coexist with them. This parallels Japan’s period of forced isolation, where they refused to trade with other countries, and some of the negativity towards foreigners that has carried over until from that. With the somewhat sad tone at the end, with Arrietty and Sho parting ways, it seems to be telling the viewer to stop the isolation and to accept others, even if they are different or “foreign.”

            Besides being a critique of Japanese isolationism, the film is also a seishun eiga, or coming-of-age film. Arrietty’s parents make a big deal out of her going on her first borrowing at the beginning of the film, but we see Arrietty step up as the archetypical “beautiful fighting girl.” While on the first borrowing, Arrietty finds a pin which she uses as a sword throughout the film. Though she never really has to fight anything with it, she says to her father that she is willing to fight off any rats that could attack. Later on in the film, her father injures his leg while searching for a new house, and Arrietty becomes the protector of the family. When Haru kidnaps her mother, it is Arrietty, not her father, who comes to the rescue. Sho helps her find and rescue her mother, but his heart problems keep him physically weak. This contrasting of the beautiful fighting girl with multiple passive men only amplifies Arrietty’s courage and strength.

           However, the feeling of a “coming of age” is conveyed not only in Arrietty’s rising to the challenges around her, but also in various shots of coupled animals. Throughout the film, it seems as if it is mating season for the animals and insects, which gives the viewer a feeling of “growing up.” At one point, Arrietty is playing with a roly-poly bug like a ball. The bug then leaves with another roly-poly. In another scene, there is a pair of birds on the roof of the house, and they fly off together. Yet again, a pair of butterflies is seen flying around together. These couples give a feeling of growing up and settling down. With all the things that Arrietty has to deal with, this really gives you a feeling that you yourself mature as you watch Arrietty mature.

            The Secret World of Arrietty is a great animated film which, through its narrative and use of animation, portrays a girl facing her challenges and coming out victorious. It is also a commentary on Japan’s isolationism, and calls viewers to shed that fear of what is foreign and instead accept things that are different.