ayao Miyazaki's first feature film begins with a flamboyant chase sequence. Master criminal Lupin and his partner Jigen are on the run with $5 billion in stolen casino money. Easily eluding their hapless pursuers, they devote a few seconds to celebration before Lupin suddenly realizes that the money they've stolen is counterfeit. The fake bills are so authentic-looking that Lupin declares them to be "goat bills," forgeries from the mysterious Duchy of Cagliostro. The tiny nation is known in criminal circles as "the black hole of counterfeiting"--no one who gets close enough to investigate it ever comes back out.
Still, the phrase "there's a first time for everything" was practically coined to describe Lupin's improbable luck. He and Jigen immediately set out for Cagliostro, ready to start poking their noses into any place they're not wanted. Barely across the border, they happen across another chase--a pretty young woman in a bridal gown frantically fleeing a carload of armed goons. Lupin recklessly leaps to the rescue, and within minutes he's unconscious at the bottom of a steep cliff, in possession of a priceless ring and neck-deep in the middle of an ancient family conspiracy. Soon spies are peering at him in the local restaurant and killer ninjas are invading his hotel room in the middle of the night. Naturally, more chases ensue.
And just to complicate things further, Interpol detective Zenigata shows up, hot on Lupin's trail as always, and backed up by a small army of police. The powerful Count Cagliostro has his own army of soldiers at the ready, protecting a fortress packed with hidden traps and laser defenses. Lupin has just Jigen's guns, the samurai Goemon's sword and his own relentless wits, which soon have everyone in Cagliostro chasing him, each other and their own tails. Lupin's after the fleeing bride, Zenigata's after Lupin, Count Cagliostro is after Lupin, the bride and a mysterious treasure. Unsurprisingly, it all comes down to a massive chase scene--one that outlasts both the plot and the film, and seems destined to outlast anime itself.
A bright but stormy night
By the time Castle of Cagliostro hit the theaters in 1980, manga artist "Monkey Punch" had established his famous thief Lupin as a national presence in Japan. Lupin had already appeared in comics, on television and in a previous feature film. In this film Miyazaki remains reasonably true to the original characters--he had written and directed a few of the TV episodes himself--but his Castle of Cagliostro script also has the flavor of a genuine Miyazaki original. Like his other films, Castle is in its lighter moments a bright, lively, authentically sweet romp; a fervent ode to joy and casual innocence. In its darker scenes it's a stormy, thrilling adventure, although Castle never gets particularly dark compared to grimmer tales like Nausicaä or Princess Mononoke. Newer Miyazaki fans may in fact be surprised at how much of Castle is sheer, buoyant slapstick.
Monkey Punch's lanky, flapping heroes contrast somewhat oddly with Miyazaki's fine-featured, trim subsidiary characters, but Castle moves along at such a brisk pace that it's hard to concentrate on anything but keeping up with the ride. And it's quite a ride--Miyazaki takes his usual care with the elaborate backdrops and multiplanar sense of depth and dimension, as characters take off into the sky, plummet into deep caverns, and hop from level to level in a maze of dangerous, fast-moving gears.
Though Castle's animation is noticeably simpler than in later Studio Ghibli works, it's still vibrant, sharp and remarkably detailed, particularly in comparison to other animation of the time. Fans who want the subtitles out of the way so they can get the full force of the artwork will be happy to know that this is a new dub, rather than a re-release of Streamline Pictures' version. While the male voices are a little high and most of the female voices are a bit low in comparison to the original, the acting quality is unusually good, and the American actors clearly convey the sense of the original Japanese voices. Dubbed or subbed, it's great to have Miyazaki's playful, frenetic film debut commercially available again. With any luck, this is just part of the flood of translated Miyazaki works that English-speaking fans have craved for well over a decade.
