Tonight is going to be huge at TIFF, and not just because it’s the Toronto festival’s kickoff. The Opening Night film is going to be a special one, as legendary Studio Ghibli director Hayao Miyazaki returns with his first movie in a decade, The Boy and the Heron.
While the title references the 1937 novel of the same name by Genzaburō Yoshino, which plays a pivotal role in the film, Miyazki is presenting an original story set in 1943 Japan during the Pacific War. A young boy coping with the death of his mother, a move to a new town, and his father’s remarriage, encounters a talking grey heron who leads him into a fantastical alternate world.
Miyazaki famously retired more than a decade ago with 2013’s The Wind Rises believed to be his final movie. Much to his millions of fans, the retirement was short-lived. This film has been a long time in the making.
Here’s the synopsis: A young boy named Mahito
yearning for his mother
ventures into a world shared by the living and the dead.
There, death comes to an end,
and life finds a new beginning.
A semi-autobiographical fantasy
about life, death, and creation,
in tribute to friendship,
from the mind of Hayao Miyazaki.
The Boy and the Heron will hit theaters and IMAX on December 8th, following an appearance at New York Film Festival.