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Verdict: This animated epic from Japan is like a Disney film by way of Akira Kurosawa.

Details: Featuring the voices of Billy Crudup, Billy Bob Thornton, Claire Danes and Minnie Driver. Directed by Hayao Miyazaki. Rated PG-13 for images of violence and gore. 2 hours, 15 minutes.

Rate it: Write your own review

Review: There's so much going on in "Princess Mononoke" that it makes Wagner's Ring Cycle look like the Teletubbies.

This animated import from Japan — where it earned more than $150 million — has been picked up by Miramax and re-dubbed in English by a blue-ribbon cast. And while it's not strictly a kids' movie, it's not exactly another example of violence-saturated anime either (that's the sex-blood-guts brand of Japanimation that's achieved cult status stateside).

If anything, "Princess Mononoke" is oddly reminiscent of such late Akira Kurosawa works as "Ran" or "Kagemusha." That is, it's an operatic epic with a complicated narrative to match its stunning visuals. In fact, given its two-hour-plus running length, we might've used a little less story. But director Hayao Miyazaki is a master filmmaker, and while he may tire us out, he never bores us.

"In ancient times," we're told, "a land lay covered in forests ... these were the days of gods and of demons." Up in the lushly forested, sparsely populated northern region, Prince Ashitaka (Billy Crudup) saves his village from a giant boar that's been turned into a hate-filled demon by what appear to be flesh-devouring bloodworms. Unfortunately, he's wounded in the process and is now infected with the same disease that possessed the animal. Unless he can find a cure, the wound will spread and eventually kill him.

So Ashitaka sets off on a journey to save himself and ends up in a place called Iron Town, where the ruler, Lady Eboshi (Minnie Driver), operates a giant ironworks that manufactures guns and bullets. In doing so, she's raped the surrounding land and incurred the wrath of various forest creatures/gods. Most dangerous is the great wolf Moro (Gillian Anderson), whose adopted human child, Princess Mononoke, aka San (Claire Danes), has vowed to kill Eboshi.

It gets more complicated from here, with boars on the march, apes threatening cannibalism (when they're not planting trees), a rascally monk (Billy Bob Thornton) with some kind of power over Eboshi and rampaging samurai doing a corrupt emperor's dirty work. While these disparate factions clash, Ashitaka pleads for harmony between nature and civilization.

The theme may be simple, but the characters are far from one-dimensional. San is as vengeful as she is brave, while Lady Eboshi, though she may be deceitful and power-hungry, also employs society's misfits — lepers, ex-prostitutes — and treats them with respect.

The film's full-tilt fantasy can be simultaneously overwhelming and simplistic. But the story just doesn't stop, and the animation is astonishing — whether it's as subtle as the limp of a wounded elk or as eye-popping as a demon-infested boar dripping with blood and rage.

Boldly innovative yet eerily innocent, "Princess Mononoke" is unlike anything you've seen in the theaters this year. It is, in the best sense, something you simply have to see for yourself.

— Eleanor Ringel Gillespie, Cox News Service

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