The Laws of Physics in an Animated Universe

   For my physics term paper, I chose to study Howl’s Moving Castle, a 2004 traditional hand-drawn animated film directed by Hayao Miyazaki from Studio Ghibli, a Japanese animation studio famous around the world for their unique and beautiful films. The story follows a plain young woman named Sophie, whose dull life is upended when she is cursed by a witch, and she seeks out the wizard Howl for help. Over the course of the film she becomes a cleaning lady for a wizard, befriends a fire demon, finds herself, finds a family, and finds love.  I chose this film because it is part of a great collection of films, and it is a less exaggerated movie (no outrageous squash and stretch or zany timing), unlike its western counterparts, and like many Ghibli films, is rooted very firmly in a world that resembles our own, where the humans move like we do, and adheres to physics like ours while also containing magic that lets characters defy these laws at the same time, at any moment. This sensibility of following physical laws until there is a reason to break them punctuates the sense of magic in the world of the film.

   In many Ghibli films, flight is a major theme, and ‘Castle’ is no exception; within the movie many characters and objects defy gravity in contrast to more human characters. At the very start of the movie, our heroine Sophie encounters Howl, who rescues her from a pair of guards and other enemies by lifting off into the air above the town building and floating over rooftops with no outside assistance or force behind the action (figure. 1), and throughout the movie Howl is seen flying or levitating like this. There are also many flying machines and aircrafts throughout the film, all constructed in such a way that their mass and shape, as well as their small fluttering wings (figure. 2), do not support their ability to fly as physics would allow it; this goes for both the huge and heavy bomber warships, and the smaller personal craft Howl pilots while visiting the king. They are aerodynamic in a hypothetical sense only. The dog Heen also uses his long ears to glide over the ground when he needs to move faster than his short legs allow. In contrast to these more fantastic elements, Sophie is often the unlucky receiver of the effects of gravity (she is frequently thrown around, carried, or crashes into things while Howl is afforded more grace via his powers), as is the Witch of the Wastes, who succumbs the a more unflattering and subtle form of gravity when her powers are stolen, and her magic can’t help her from showing her true age.

Fig. 1 Howl and Sophie

Fig. 2 Flying machine

 In this world, most characters experience inertia and overlapping action (like hair and clothes and limbs following the body in motion and continuing in that motion), law of acceleration and motion, but certain occasions of drama cause characters to break the rules. In one scene, Howl is protecting Sophie’s house from enemy bombs, and as one hurtles toward the ground, he chases after it, and seconds later overcomes it (and stops it from detonating), despite its mass and acceleration being greater than he is, and having air resistance working against him. The bombs terminal velocity is greater than Howls; it’s physically impossible that he would have caught up. In an instance that both follows and breaks laws, Howl carries Sophie to safety and lets her go to fly into the door back home. Her path of action, instead of falling straight down, sends her falling horizontally in an arc at the door, but normal physics kicks in again when her motion is stopped by crashing into stairs, the stairs being the unbalanced force. In another moment, Howl and Sophie are escaping the witch Suliman, and shoot through a glass roof into the sky, only to change direction without being effected by gravity or an opposing force.

   In ‘Castle’, many structures and characters defy physical believability in how they are put together with the aid of magic. The biggest example of this is the moving castle itself, which is a hodgepodge of metal and wood and brick seemingly thrown together on stilt-like clawed metal legs (figure. 3). Nothing appears to fit together in any discernible way, and the legs are too thin to support its weight or its ungainly way of moving.  Similarly, the character Turniphead, a sentient scarecrow Sophie encounters and befriends in the wastes, is constructed from a pair of sticks and a turnip, wearing and old suit (figure. 4). He moves primarily by bouncing around on the end of his stick, sometimes at great heights, and, like the castle, would not be able to actually stay together without the aid of magical forces, as physical laws mean he would fall apart. Certain living characters challenge believability as well, most notably the Witch of the Waste, a hulking woman whose sheer size, shape and weight would crumble quickly (or at least not last long) due to our physics, much like individuals with gigantism.

Fig. 3 The Moving Castle

Fig. 4 Turniphead

   In the end, there could be so much more to cover about the movie, but what remains is more magic than physics (the changing doorway, Howl transforming into a bird and back, Sophie’s shifting between young and old age, etc.), and requires suspension of disbelief, yet doesn't pull you out of the movie. Howl’s Moving Castle is a beautiful film, a work of pure artistry from Studio Ghibli. It’s full of beautiful and colorful environments and characters that draw you in.  To conclude, in this film, Howl and Sophie’s world feel similar to ours, the laws of physics followed the same way as ours, until they are broken on the whim of magical occurrence. This contrast is used at the most important story points of the film, and not overdone to create a sense of wonder, and we experience that wonder with Sophie as she does. The film lets you immerse yourself in that way, and I certainly am every time I watch it.