Grave of the Fireflies (Dudok de Wit Alex (freelance critic specialising in animation))(Paperback / softback)

On its release in 1988, Grave of the Fireflies riveted audiences with its uncompromising drama. Directed at Studio Ghibli by its co-founder Isao Takahata, and based on an autobiographical story by Akiyuki Nosaka, this portrait of two Japanese children struggling to survive in the dying days of World War Two told its story with a gritty realism unprecedented in animation. It has since been hailed as a classic of both anime and war cinema. In 2018, USA Today ranked it the greatest animated film of all time. Yet Ghibli's sombre masterpiece remains little analysed outside Japan, even as its meaning is fiercely contested. Takahata himself lamented that few had grasped his message. In this, the first book-length study of the film in English, Alex Dudok de Wit explores its themes, visual devices and groundbreaking use of animation, as well as the political context in
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