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'Howl's Moving Castle': Imaginative marvels

Working in hand-drawn animation, thought by some to be antiquated, Japanese master Hayao Miyazaki is content to push the bounds of imagination rather than technology.

As he demonstrated with 2002's Spirited Away, which won the animated feature Oscar, and earlier films such as Princess Mononoke, he is interested in storytelling rooted in the vocabulary of dreams and a transformational magic that is best conveyed through cartoon art.

Walt Disney Pictures 'Howl's Moving Castle' B The verdict: Awesome, dream-like visuals and a convoluted story add to another Miyazaka animated epic. Director: Hayao Miyazaki Voices: Emily Mortimer, Christian Bale, Billy Crystal, Lauren Bacall Run time: 110 minutes Release date: June 10, 2005 Rating: PG for frightening images and brief mild language. See showtimes On the web Official movie site View the trailer    Trailers require Quicktime Rate "Howl's Moving Castle"   Go see it   Make it a matinee   Wait to rent   Don't bother Voter Limit: Once per Hour View Poll Results

His latest film, Howl's Moving Castle, based on a popular children's novel by British writer Diana Wynne Jones, is already a box office hit in Japan. It arrives here tweaked by Disney, in an English language version newly dubbed by the likes of Christian Bale, Lauren Bacall and Billy Crystal.

Visually, it is a treat throughout its two-hour running time, which tested the squirm limit of youngsters at the screening I attended. The film, with its antiwar and pro-ecology themes, as well as messages about the power of love and human resilience, is, after all, more geared to adults than tots.

If it is a cut below Spirited Away, that is because its story is less cohesive or accessible. Howl's Moving Castle works best for its parts than for its whole, though its momentary images are truly stunning.

It takes the shape of a classic fairy tale, then twists itself into a mystical Mobius strip of tangents. As with so many of Miyazaki's films, it begins with a young girl, who will go on an odyssey that will test her courage and her world view.

In this case, it is lowly millinery shop girl Sophie (voiced by Emily Mortimer), who has a curse placed on her by the vindictive Witch of the Waste (Bacall). The spell turns Sophie into an old, bent-backed crone (Jean Simmons), a prospect so mortifying that Sophie flees, hoping to stumble onto a remedy out in the world.

Like Dorothy journeying to Oz, Sophie goes off in search of a shape-shifting wizard named Howl, who lives in a mobile home so fantastical it deserves its prominence as the title character.

Belching smoke and loaded with cogs, gears and pulleys, the castle ambles along on mechanical chicken feet, an imposing, walking junkyard that houses unexpected worlds within. Rube Goldberg would be proud, even though the many moving parts on the castle's exterior seem not to serve any practical function. Still, it is a wondrous piece of fantasy architecture, home to blond-maned Howl (Batman Begins' Bale), who had earlier rescued Sophie from a couple of hassling soldiers, then sprouted wings and took her flying.

Adding to the Wizard of Oz parallels is the arrival of a scarecrow named Turnip and a yapping dog. They must have been completely out of tin men in Japan. Inside the castle is Howl's handy assistant Calcifer, a little fireball who supplies the place with energy. In the movie's only casting miscue, Crystal yuks up the character, turning him into a standard comic Disney sidekick, surely a change from the original movie.

Just beyond the castle, a war rages and Howl is conscripted to serve both sides of the conflict. It is clear that neither faction is the good side, however.

That is one of the few things that remains clear in Howl's Moving Castle, which grows increasingly convoluted in its second half, even as the visuals continue to delight. This is simply Miyazaki's non-linear style of storytelling, but if it requires repeat viewings — or the purchase of a DVD — to grasp it all, Disney probably will not mind.