With simulated waves, animation tables, and dozens of authentic sketches on show, a brand new exhibition within the Oscars museum affords immersion into the aquatic world of “Ponyo,” Hayao Miyazaki’s cinematic basic.
The Academy Museum of Motion Pictures opened in 2021 with a retrospective devoted to the grand grasp of Japanese animation.
Nearly 5 years later, dozens of drawings, storyboards and different parts created for the movie and gifted to the Los Angeles establishment by Miyazaki’s world-famous Studio Ghibli are happening show.
“It’s such a treasure to have, we should share it with our visitors,” the exhibit’s curator, Jessica Niebel, instructed AFP.
The museum has devoted over 350 sq. meters to the magical 2008 film.
Inspired by the Hans Christian Andersen fairy story “The Little Mermaid,” Miyazaki’s story facilities round a goldfish with a woman’s face who’s rescued by a five-year-old boy, Sosuke.
Despite the reluctance of her father, the underwater wizard Fujimoto, little Ponyo falls in love along with her new pal and provides up her magical powers to turn out to be human.
Entirely hand drawn, the movie was hailed as a visible masterpiece marking Miyazaki’s return to the normal animation of his early profession, after incorporating laptop generated photos in “Spirited Away” and “Howl’s Moving Castle.”
“What’s really special about ‘Ponyo’ is he instructed his team right from the beginning that everything in this movie needs to move,” mentioned Niebel, recalling how the artists created a lush aquatic world, with swirling colours underwater and waves that shifted with the climate.
Animation fans will discover sketches of among the movie’s key sequences, drawn in pencil, and projections of its most majestic moments.
But the immersive exhibition is above all “geared towards children,” the movie’s main viewers, Niebel mentioned.
Younger children can romp round on rolling blue installations that mimic waves, slide a ‘Ponyo’ determine throughout an ocean wall, or cover in a duplicate of Sosuke’s inexperienced bucket which he used to gather goldfish.
Children and their dad and mom are urged to sit down at animation tables to place sharks, jellyfish and crabs, taking images body by body to create their very own animated sequence — all underneath the benevolent eyes of the movie’s elders at a retirement residence threatened by rising waters.
Niebel mentioned she hopes the exhibit may “invite the younger generation to maybe think about becoming a filmmaker” or a inventive artist.
The exhibit opens Saturday and runs till January 2027. Admission is free for youngsters underneath 17.
© 2026 AFP