Pom Poko
Directed by Isao Takahata
- adventure
- animation
- fantasy
The story
The Raccoons of the Tama Hills are being forced from their homes by the rapid development of houses and shopping malls. As it becomes harder to find food and shelter, they decide to band together and fight back. The Raccoons practice and perfect the ancient art of transformation until they are even able to appear as humans in hilarious circumstances.
What it’s like
Hand-drawn Studio Ghibli watercolour in lush, soft-edged greens and earthy browns, with the hills of Tama rendered as a living, breathing landscape that gradually gives way to raw construction-site beige and the flat grey of new housing. Sunlight filters through summer foliage and the frames linger on wide, painterly vistas, while the raccoons' transformations arrive as bursts of colour and cartoonish slapstick. Music is a gentle, folksy orchestral score with plucked strings and flutes, punctuated by rustic percussion during the mischief. The vibe is bittersweet and whimsical, a warm comic satire with a melancholy undertow about loss and the costs of progress, the kind of film that suits a rainy afternoon or a comfort rewatch. Pacing is loose and episodic, moving between playful set pieces and quieter scenes of grief and resignation, and the emotional arc follows a community of animals learning to hold together against forces they cannot defeat. Intensity is mild: some cartoon peril, a few tense standoffs, and one sombre funeral-like sequence, with no gore and no sexual content. Ideal for viewers who love gentle animation, Japanese folklore, and environmental fables with a wry, lightly sad heart.
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