The Boy and The Heron: What is Art? What is an Artist?

I am pondering art and life again

My favorite film of 2023 is The Boy and the Heron, written and directed by the great Hayao Miyazaki. It’s a masterpiece by a master, a singular and vivid feat of imagination. I adore its poignant and sorrowful atmosphere, its moments of fancy, its dreamlike logic. And, its hand-drawn animation is absolutely gorgeous.

I have devoured stories my whole life. Even when engaging with films that end up surprising me, I can usually tell where I’ll be in the next two or three minutes. I tend to see at least the next half step ahead. This was not the case during my first viewing of The Boy and the Heron. I was genuinely swept away, and found myself asking, with the wonder of a child experiencing something new: where am I, and how did I get here? I do not mean to suggest that I was upset or confused by the film. In truth, I was awestruck. 

Some of my favorite works give me the impression that they have come from a mind or point-of-view unlike any other. I realized this after listening to author Neil Gaiman’s advice to aspiring artists. He affirms that because every person has a unique point-of-view and vision, each person has the capacity to make art that no one else can. I agree with him completely. My favorite art makes me think that no one else could have done this in this exact way.

Only Miyazaki could have made The Boy and the Heron. There are things about it that only he understands, and I find that wonderful.

I’m still pondering different moments in the film, and there’s one I keep coming back to. I will try to only summarize as much of the plot as I need to in order to contextualize the scene I want to focus on. Still, spoilers follow. I highly recommend watching the film before getting anything spoiled!

The film takes place in Japan during World War II. In the opening scene, the film’s protagonist, a young boy named Mahito (Soma Santoki) loses his mother in a fire. He later moves to a home in the countryside that belongs to his aunt Natsuko (Yoshino Kimura), who is now also his stepmother after Mahito’s father has remarried. In the woods near the home is a strange tower. Legends from Natsuko’s side of the family and from the people who work in the home claim that the tower fell from the sky, and that Mahito’s great granduncle disappeared into the tower long ago. One day, Natsuko wanders into the tower, and Mahito follows her. The tower houses a fantastical world, filled with wondrous people and places. It’s also a world in which the veil between the living and the dead is porous. Mahito’s journey through the tower eventually brings him to his great granduncle (Shōhei Hino). The great granduncle has been keeping the world inside the tower intact by balancing a set of building blocks. He wants a successor who can maintain the world of the tower after him, and he tries to convince Mahito to take over.

The specific scene that I want to touch on in this discussion is when the great granduncle tells Mahito to add or replace blocks in the set in order to be the successor. When he offers Mahito blocks to choose from, Mahito says that they aren’t blocks, but instead caskets.

As I said earlier, only Miyazaki fully understands every aspect of the movie. Still, its richness allows viewers to find their own meaning.

I read the character of the great granduncle as an artist, not unlike Miyazaki. The great granduncle is the keeper of a fantastical world, almost like a god. In an analogous way, Miyazaki has created wondrous worlds during his decades-long career as a filmmaker. Viewers get lost in the fantasy worlds of Miyazaki’s films, not unlike how Mahito gets lost in the tower his great granduncle maintains.

But if the tower in the film is maintained by a set of building blocks that are actually caskets, what does this mean in regards to art and artists? Is a piece of art a dead, inert object, like a casket or a grave? Does being an artist mean being the god of dead or dying worlds?

There is a somber, sorrowful way to interpret this idea. A pessimistic view of art would hold it as nothing more than a fanciful distraction. The world of a novel or film or painting or opera is just a fake, flawed imitation of the real world. It is pointless, a waste of time. An artist, therefore, wastes their life.

These are, of course, extreme views. But, as an artist, I occasionally hear echoes of these sentiments. Sometimes, they come from my own doubts; sometimes, they come from the people near me. And, I find myself asking: is there a point to what I am doing? Are my efforts and goals to make art useless?

The answers to these questions that I find myself asking is a resounding no. I also think my reading of The Boy and the Heron reaffirms the idea that most of us agree on: art is important.

It is important because of how it affects us, even when we are no longer experiencing the art.

Mahito does get lost in the dying world of the tower. However, the tower is also where he has the experiences he requires to change his life for the better. The tower is where he works through his grief over the loss of his mother. The tower is where he finally accepts Natsuko as his stepmother. When they leave the tower and return to the home in the countryside, the scene is joyful, and Mahito is a different person from who he was walking into the tower earlier.

He had to go into the tower.

There are several tragic elements in The Boy and the Heron. Perhaps one such aspect is the fact that the great granduncle never leaves his tower.

Perhaps a book is dead if it is kept in a drawer. Perhaps a film is inert if the reel stays in a storage room. Even if those possibilities aren’t true, I submit that art comes fullest to life when an audience member experiences it. As much as I believe that the first people artists make things for are themselves, I do also believe that art is communication. It is meant to be shared, to express ideas, feelings, perspectives. The way in which the artist and the audience connect through a work of art—with each on opposite sides—is a source of magic. It’s alchemy: telepathy mixed with suggestion and implication. It’s strange and wonderful. This is also how one work can inspire a variety of meanings.

And when the audience member puts down the book or walks out of the movie theater, whatever they experience will linger with them. Art is not something to get lost in forever. Not unlike what happens with Mahito, the audience goes back into the world with perhaps a new idea, feeling, or perspective. At the very least, they will have a memory to carry with them. And, their experience might make their day, week, year, life better.

Plus, because they will think about it and remember it, art lives longer when it’s shared.

The idea that art can enrich life is further bolstered by the film, in a way that I did not realize until after my first viewing. After reading a bit about the film, I learned that when it was released in Japan, its original title was How Do You Live? The title was a reference to a novel by the same name, written by Genzaburo Yoshino, which Miyazaki personally likes. The title was changed later because the film is not an adaptation of the novel.

Yet, the novel appears in the film. Before his quest, Mahito finds the book in the home in the countryside. Inside is a note from his late mother. She left it for him to read when he got older. Tears drop from his eyes as he reads the book. Not long after, he has to journey into the tower. 

A novel, a film, a work of art can instruct one on how to live; Miyazaki seems to be implying this. And I agree.

We should make the art that only we can make. We should share the art we feel ready to share.

Only Miyazaki could have made this movie. Now that he has shared it, everyone who watches it will walk away with their own meaning.

A cautionary portrait of the artist as a lonely god: this is something I took away from The Boy and the Heron. There is so much I can say about this incredible film.