The Wind Rises

"Giovanni Battista Caproni: "Airplanes are beautiful, cursed dreams, waiting for the sky to swallow them up. ""

The Wind Rises is a 2013 film directed by Hayao Miyazaki animated by Studio Ghibli. It is his last film before a prolonged period of retirement (although he has returned and started work on the unreleased How Do You Live?), and one of the last films produced by the studio before their restructuring. The film was based on Miyazaki's own manga, which itself is based on a biographical novel, The Wind Has Risen, written by Tatsuo Hori. The Wind Rises was released to critical acclaim, being nominated for an Academy Award for Best Animated Feature (losing to Disney's Frozen). The score was composed by frequent collaborator Joe Hisaishi.

The film follows the life of aircraft designer Jiro Horikoshi, and his life leading up to designing the Mitsubishi A6M Zero — one of the most deadly planes when it was introduced in early World War II, as well as his romance with the fictional Nahoko Satomi. During this, Italian aircraft designer Giovanni Battista Caproni offers advice and insight to Jiro inside his Dreamland. Its primary conflict revolves around the beauty and magnificence of airplanes versus how airplanes are used as weapons of destruction. Of course being a Miyazaki and Ghibli production, it features many instances of lush, rolling hills and long shots into the distance.

"Nohoko: "You must live, darling. You must live." Caproni: "She was beautiful, just like the wind.""
 * All Just a Dream: The opening sequence. Jiro's plane is crashing, and he is falling from the sky... then he wakes up.
 * Arc Words: Japanese Boy, frequently said by Caproni to Jiro.
 * Animation Bump: The animation becomes much smoother during the Great Kantō earthquake. The film, usually animated in threes (~eight frames a second) switches to ones (~twenty-four frames a second) an twos (~twelve frames a second) to reflect the intense shaking caused by the earthquake. Bonus points for the Cast of Snowflakes in the backgrounds.
 * Bilingual Bonus: Jiro obtains an English magazine about aviation. The magazine features on topic English sentences regarding the topic of aviation, and is readable by a native speaker despite it containing major grammatical errors.
 * Bittersweet Ending:


 * Cast of Snowflakes: Visible in almost every single long shot depicting people. What makes this more impressive is the fact that people are depicted doing their daily lives, like shopping or designing airplanes, creating an immersive and realistic environment.
 * Creative Closing Credits: The ending credits are imposed over a slideshow of backgrounds from the film.
 * Dreamland: Jiro's dreams takes in a place with ornate and spanning grass fields. In these sequences Caproni and Jiro marvel at the various airplanes as they take off and fly.
 * Freeze-Frame Bonus: The aforementioned English magazine.
 * Ghibli Hills: Yet another entry on the Trope Namer's filmography. In the beginning of the film, Jiro flies through these. These are a frequent shot in scenes around Nohoko's home, and they are prominent in all Dream Sequences in the film.
 * Precocious Crush: Jiro first meets Nohoko during the Great Kantō earthquake, when she hasn't come of age yet. The latter parts of the film focuses on the romance of Jiro and the grown up Nohoko.
 * Retraux: The film's audio track was mixed in mono, and many engine sounds were produced by the human mouth. Ghibli also added artificial film grain to the film, despite it being fully digital.
 * Scenery Porn: The film often comes to a standstill for a long shot focused on scenery. Ghibli Hills are common in the backgrounds of the film.
 * Star-Crossed Lovers: Jiro
 * Time Skip: Years can elapse between scenes in the film, and this trope is used liberally throughout the film. Sometimes it's not obvious that one of these has occurred, which can cause confusion.
 * Together Umbrella: Nohoko and Jiro uses one of these during an abrupt and sudden rain. After the rain finishes, Nohoko marvels at the environment and a rainbow.