[Dr Kain]

Howl's Moving Castle - It came out on BD today and I forgot all about it until it showed up at my door. As such, we watched it this evening as I have not seen it since 2005 while my g/f has watched it on DVD a million times. This was also the first time we had ever watched the original Japanese language and I found it to be no different than the dub. Disney did an excellent job when they casted the movie as all of the characters sounded similar in both languages. Hell, I can see now why they even gave Billy Crystal the role as Calcifire, as he sounds just like him. Anyway, the movie itself is quite good, but I do have some nitpicks with it. The whole scene with Sophie's mom when she had aged was just random (seriously, her mother seemed oblivious to her daughter's misfortune) and I don't get why her age kept changing towards the end of the movie. That, and the ending just seemed to be a little rushed as I couldn't follow the last 10 minutes. Despite that though, it is a great movie and one I was glad to have watched again. Easily one of my Miyazaki's best, but Mononoke is still my favorite (would be nice if they brought both that and Spirited Away to BD already!!).