Princess Mononoke (1997)

Let me be straight with you: Princess Mononoke is a great film. Four stars, no hesitation. But if you've come here expecting me to call it the greatest thing Studio Ghibli has ever made, I'm going to have to disappoint you, because I don't think it is. And I think that's actually an interesting thing to sit with, because the fact that a film this ambitious and this beautiful can feel like something other than the absolute peak of its studio's output says everything about just how extraordinary that studio is.

What Hayao Miyazaki and his team do with animation here is genuinely hard to put into words. I've seen a lot of animation across a lot of eras, and Ghibli's art style operates on a different plane entirely. Most other studios' work looks like a rough napkin sketch by comparison, and I mean that without a shred of exaggeration. For 1997 especially, Princess Mononoke is jaw-dropping. Every single frame looks like something you'd frame and hang on a wall. The forests breathe. The fire moves like fire actually moves. The scale of the action sequences is staggering. It's the kind of film where you occasionally catch yourself just staring at the background, at some tiny detail in the corner of the frame that nobody would have blamed them for skipping, and you think: they did all of this by hand.

The world it builds is rich and alive in a way that a lot of fantasy films struggle to achieve. There's genuine weight to the conflict at the heart of it, and that's largely down to how well-drawn the characters are. Ashitaka makes for a solid lead, principled and watchable throughout. But it's San and Lady Eboshi who really grab you and refuse to let go. Both of them are completely compelling, and crucially, both of them are completely right and completely wrong at the same time. That's rare. Most films, animated or otherwise, flinch from that kind of moral murkiness. Princess Mononoke leans into it. You understand every side. You don't get to pick a clean winner. The film trusts you to hold that complexity, and that trust is one of its best qualities.

I've been a Ghibli fan for as long as I can remember, and I've reviewed a fair few of their films here. I adored Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind (1984), and you can see the DNA of that film running through Princess Mononoke's veins: the environmental conscience, the morally complicated world, the female characters with genuine power and agency. Miyazaki was clearly working through ideas across both films, and seeing how far he developed them is fascinating. I'd also say that if you want to see Ghibli doing something on a similarly epic scale but with a completely different emotional register, Castle in the Sky (1986) is well worth your time.

So why not five stars? Honestly, it's a personal thing more than a flaw in the film itself. There are moments where the sheer density of the world and its politics edges slightly ahead of the emotional core, and I found myself engaged more than I was moved. It's a film I admire enormously. It's a film I'd recommend without hesitation. But there are other Ghibli films that hit me somewhere deeper, and I'd be lying if I pretended otherwise.

None of that should put you off, though. Princess Mononoke is one of the most ambitious animated films ever made, and it earns that ambition. The action is thrilling, the visuals are stunning, the moral landscape is genuinely complex, and the whole thing carries a weight and seriousness that commands respect. It's special. It just isn't, for me personally, the peak.

Four stars.

Rating: ★★★★  | Year: 1997  | Watched: 2011-03-04

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Where to watch

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Related on Movies With Macca

More from Hayao Miyazaki: Castle in the Sky (1986) · Kiki's Delivery Service (1989) · Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind (1984) · My Neighbor Totoro (1988)
More from Japan: Mononoke the Movie: The Phantom in the Rain (2024) · Mononoke the Movie: Chapter II - The Ashes of Rage (2025) · Blue (1993) · The Ghost of Yotsuya (1959)
More from the 1990s: Lessons of Darkness (1992) · Shinjuku Boys (1995) · Blue (1993) · Cemetery Man (1994)
More adventure: Alice in Wonderland (1951) · The Eagle (1925) · Louisiana Story (1948) · The General (1926)
More fantasy: Viy (1967) · Alice in Wonderland (1951) · Mononoke the Movie: The Phantom in the Rain (2024) · Mononoke the Movie: Chapter II - The Ashes of Rage (2025)