Tales from Earthsea

Vokes

I'm thinking of going to see this as it's hitting Ireland / UK theatres this weekend.

For those who may have already seen it on DVD ...is it any good?

I understand the reception was someone muted compared to other Studio Ghibli films in Japan.

Rhyme

Not especially good to be perfectly honest, it's by Gorio Miyazaki (not Hayao) and he's not nearly as good as his brother(?).

The visuals are very similar to the previous Ghibli titles but this one misses the mark in the story telling and character/plot development.

Karl Hungus

Rhyme wrote:

it's by Gorio Miyazaki (not Hayao) and he's not nearly as good as his brother(?).

Father.

Rhyme

Karl Hungus wrote:

Father.

Ah, thanks. 'Brother' was a guess.

constitutionus

just out of interest is this in anyway connected to the earthsea mini series that was on telly a while back? i dont mean same actors or anything but just in terms of the universe it inhabits.

Fysh

constitutionus wrote:

just out of interest is this in anyway connected to the earthsea mini series that was on telly a while back? i dont mean same actors or anything but just in terms of the universe it inhabits.

It's based on the Earthsea series by Ursula Le Guin. Looks like the miniseries was a bit of a butchery of the original material though, so Tales from Earthsea might not be all that similar.

Vokes

I'm right in saying that Tales from Earthsea is loosley based on The Farthest Shore? Whereas the Sci-Fi miniseries was a hack job of the 1st 2 books i think.

Hopefully ill get to see Tales tonight or tomorrow.

constitutionus

ah . had a feeling it'd be something like that. my brother was a big fan of the books. might check it out for the curiosity value, thanks lads.

Vokes

Caught this on Tuesday last and well its a mixed bag tbh.

It is mostly adapted from the third book and various bits and pieces taken from the other 3 books. And while I didn't like that particular aspect of it, I can see why it was done as the The Farthest Shore is fairly scant on action and characters.

One thing that annoyed me as a fan of the books (but I guess wouldn't be apparent to a non-reader) was that it appeared to me that Earthsea was wrongly portrayed where all the locations seemed to be in the same part of the world or same landmass, whereas the written Earthsea is supposed to be this desolate archipelago with lots of spread-out locations and ...well, sea!

Other then that, the animation was fairly nice and Cob was very creepy looking (and excellently voiced by Willem Dafoe). Timothy Dalton also does a great low-key performance for the archmage Sparrowhawk.

I think one is strictly for hardcore fans of Studio Ghibli and Le Guin

MiloFoxburr

SofaKing wrote:

Caught this on Tuesday last and well its a mixed bag tbh.

It is mostly adapted from the third book and various bits and pieces taken from the other 3 books. And while I didn't like that particular aspect of it, I can see why it was done as the The Farthest Shore is fairly scant on action and characters.

One thing that annoyed me as a fan of the books (but I guess wouldn't be apparent to a non-reader) was that it appeared to me that Earthsea was wrongly portrayed where all the locations seemed to be in the same part of the world or same landmass, whereas the written Earthsea is supposed to be this desolate archipelago with lots of spread-out locations and ...well, sea!

Other then that, the animation was fairly nice and Cob was very creepy looking (and excellently voiced by Willem Dafoe). Timothy Dalton also does a great low-key performance for the archmage Sparrowhawk.

I think one is strictly for hardcore fans of Studio Ghibli and Le Guin

Is it worth getting the books? The film interested me enough to think about picking them up. Seen them in Chapters before I went to see it and they were fairly cheap

~Rebel~

Yeah the books are great - well worth a buy! I've only actually read the first 3, havent gotten around to the 4th, which was written much later.

Having read them, and now finally succumbing to the masses and reading Harry Potter, i cant help but think Rowling took a bit of inspiration from the academy in book 1 of earthsea. Though earthsea is darker. Anybody else think this maybe? Even just down to the subdivision of magic into those particular categories etc.

Anyway, yeah give em a read!