Windaria

A Parent's Guide to Anime
Rated: G
Suitable for Family Viewing

Reviewd by Julia Pfaffenberger:

A beautifully animated story of a valley caught in the middle of two warring kingdoms, Windaria is a tangle of themes -- Romeo and Juliet, the emotional effects of war, young hero saves his people. However, even though the art was well done, Windaria was too much a blatant imitation of Nausicaa (Hayao Miyazaki) for my taste. The protagonist is not always likeable--and he is not meant to be; Windaria is the story of how he realizes in the end what he did wrong--and the plot is scattered. However, the flight scenes are superbly done and the action sequenses are great.

The Windaria dub is obviously aimed at the whole family, but there are several things that might make this movie unsuitable for small children. At one point the story's hero gets drunk and betrays his wife, although it's not shown. The Romeo and Juliet subplot is resoved, fittingly, with rather bloody and sudden suicides. Very small children would definitely not understand this. The hero's wife is killed (also not shown). Needless to say, Windaria does not have a happy ending.

Despite the scattered and randomly twisting plot, unresolved characters, and subplots that seem to have no bearing on the story, I did like Windaria. I wouldn't recommend it for small children because of strong themes, but its unpredictability is a nice change from most anime.

If anyone knows if the dubbed version was edited, drop me a line!

Parent's Guide Rating:

green (suitable for family viewing)