HIROMASA YONEBAYASHI - Acing Arrietty

Disney is easily the most widely recognised animation studio in the world, but the most beloved, the one whose very mention puts a smile on the face of its devoted fans, is Japan’s Studio Ghibli.
Under the stewardship of legendary director Hayao Miyazaki, Studio Ghibli have produced an impressive number of classic films over the past 25 years, among them the seminal My Neighbour Totoro, Spirited Away, and Howl’s Moving Castle. 
Their latest, Arrietty, is an adaptation of English author Mary Norton’s much loved children’s novel, The Borrowers. It is also one of the few Ghibli films to be helmed by someone other than Miyazaki himself, in this case debut director Hiromasa Yonebayashi. But the 36 year old animator - the youngest ever director of a Ghibli production - is at pains to point out that the studio founder was very much involved in the making of the film.
“Mr Hayao Miyazaki is the mastermind behind this project,” he says. “In fact, he had wanted to adapt The Borrowers himself some 40 years ago.”
And though the film had long been in gestation in the mind of Miyazaki, Yonebayashi admits to being newcomer to Norton’s world of tiny, secretive humans.
“I am sorry to say that before Mr Miyazaki asked me to direct this film, I had never read the original novels,” he explains. “When Mr Miyazaki and producer Toshio Suzuki asked me if I would direct the next film, I had never considered the job of directing ever and did not think that I was capable of it.  Therefore, I turned down the offer at first.”
Part of that initial trepidation came from the fact that Arrietty would not only be Yonebayashi’s first film as director, it would also mark the first time that one of the studio’s animators stepped up to call the shots. “I felt the pressure. I still do not understand why I was asked to direct this film. The producer Mr Suzuki said he had offered me the job after hearing Mr Miyazaki talk about my work on the last film, Ponyo, whereas Mr Miyazaki said he had a hunch.”
As an animator, Yonebayashi was able to bring a very specific visual style to the film. “I wanted it to be a film that can only be done in animation.  It is convenient to exaggerate or even be untruthful in animation, for example expanding the kitchen space further than it should in the first scene where Arrietty enters the kitchen, or drawing things that you would normally find around you in gigantic sizes.  We also worked very hard to animate the movement of water which would be difficult to do in real live features…"
But he also looked to more traditional live action cinema for inspiration. “When designing the look of the little people, I watched several films which featured Irish characters; for example Ryan’s Daughter and Gone With The Wind.  I also used as reference The Secret Garden and Toma’s Heart (a Japanese comic) while I was drawing the storyboards. You may see their influences in the film’s visual style.”

_TRAVIS JOHNSON