Princess Mononoke and Japan's Cultural Identity Crisis

Introduction: Cultural Loss and the Role of Cinema

Although Japanese culture is generally perceived, particularly within the Western world, as a homogeneous culture that has lived under a top-down structure of government, there is instead a profound sense of identity loss. According to some authors, this is the result of postwar contact with the United States during the second half of the twentieth century. Indeed, today's young Japanese are increasingly American — not only in their passion for the entertainment and food products offered by the West, but even in terms of the language they speak, right down to the accent. Older people especially are therefore having a difficult time dealing with the cultural divide between what was once considered foreign and even alien. Now, particularly in the digital age, cultures are being accepted and incorporated to create something different from either the American or the Japanese culture, producing a type of divide in the process.

Perhaps this is one of the best reasons for creating works of art such as Miyazaki Hayao's 1997 epic, Princess Mononoke. The film presents not only an alternative to the current sense of broken cultures and relationships, but also provides a profound identification with this idea of being broken. Princess Mononoke offers a problematic of archetypes and icons, including centuries-long conceptions such as the untouchability of the emperor and the iconization of the feminine. The film does not, however, leave the broken image as is. Instead, a new vision of Japan is created, showing the country as finding itself at a turning point in history.

What makes the film particularly interesting is the fact that the loss depicted is not so much of the long-held traditions of male-female relationships or an emperor-ruled world filled with samurai warriors. Instead, the Japan presented in the film is a country devoted to and ruled by nature. In accessing this distantly past relationship of Japan with nature, Miyazaki also offers a future vision of Japan, in which the broken present might be healed by the past and by a forward-looking perspective.

Subverting Traditional Japanese Myths

One of the main contrasts found in Princess Mononoke is between the traditional myth — in which history belongs to the court and the samurai aristocracy — and an idealized, premodern Japan. In this idealization, the Japanese lived as a homogeneous nation in harmony with nature. The film therefore does not mourn the loss of the emperors or of homogeneous culture in the face of continuous Americanization. Instead, the central loss it mourns is the human connection with nature.

In this sense, one might say that the film undermines the traditional identity myths of Japan by offering a counternarrative. There are two important cultural myths that the film defamiliarizes: the traditional view of the feminine and the myth of Japanese harmony with nature. The latter myth was often supported by the conception that the feminine and the natural were profoundly connected.

Another important subversion is the defamiliarization of historical expectations by setting the film during the Muromachi period in the fourteenth century. In this way, conventional expectations for a film set in this era are discarded. Whereas the usual expectation for such films was a portrayal of "Japanese high culture" in terms of elements such as the tea ceremony, Noh theater, and landscape gardens, Princess Mononoke provided a mythical vision that is not only literally removed from the capital, but also symbolically.

Instead of increasingly literate samurai, the world of Princess Mononoke presents a nonrational, non-human world where natural and supernatural forces coincide. This is the film's dominating image. On the other hand, there is the increasing threat posed to this world by the human world, ruled as it was by the Emperor and the samurai. The forces of the natural and the feminine are therefore threatened by those of the male, human, intellectual, and unnatural environment that Japan was becoming at the time.

In demonstrating this, the film subverts what is known as the "samurai ethic" promoted by traditional cinema depicting the period. Instead of the conventional opening scene showing a battle and the courage of those fighting, Princess Mononoke begins with a scene from nature, portraying the mountains. The superimposed words indicate a time during which Japan was covered by forests where gods lived, depicting a mythical, natural space. At the same time, the space is not created as a refuge but rather as a basis of resistance — and perhaps even violence.

Unconventional Female Characters and Gender Roles

Perhaps the clearest and most significant break — not only from traditional cinema, but also from social values — is the film's undermining of the feminine tradition. A woman governs Tatara in the film. Lady Eboshi has created Tatara as a utopian refuge where outcast women and those with incurable illnesses could find rest for their bodies and souls. As such, she stands in opposition to the forest creatures as well as to Princess Mononoke, the "possessed princess." It is significant that the opposing human force in the film is also female. Because she was raised by a female wolf and is possessed by the fearsome nature spirits, San wishes to destroy all things human. As the proponent of human life, Lady Eboshi stands against her.

There are therefore three highly unconventional female characters: Eboshi, San, and Moro, the female wolf who raised the princess. All three possess characteristics that are traditionally ascribed to males, especially in cinema. While Eboshi cares for the sick, the dying, and those cast out from society, she is also concerned with maintaining a military stance against her opponents. Moro, the wolf, is not only a wise and brave mother, but also a ferocious killer. San is perhaps the most unconventional of all — she is almost unrelentingly violent in her actions, even to the point of sucking blood from her wolf mother's wounds.

What makes Eboshi significantly unconventional is her independent rulership of Tatara. She does not rely on any family or male support. Her traditionally female nurturing side is more than balanced by the traditionally male drive toward battle and defense. As such, she operates without any historical precedent. Her drive is almost exclusively focused on the destruction of the violent and dangerous spirits of the forest.

The film also carries highly unconventional religious overtones, as represented by San. While Miyazaki's work has long included a common connection between young girls and myth, this connection is portrayed unconventionally in San's character. San adheres to the myths of early Shinto, in which not only individuals but also animals, rocks, and mountains could become forest spirits or gods — beings who attained divine status because of their awesome powers rather than any moral basis. Morality was attributed to gods only later, when Buddhism entered Japan. San has the potential to become a god because of her supernatural powers, as manifest in her fighting capability and her telepathic link with Moro and other animals. She is, however, almost completely unable to bond with human beings. In this way, she presents the god myth of the era as something to be feared rather than loved. There was no drive to be helpful or to provide a connecting factor to the human paradigm from the spiritual world. As the representative and housing environment of these gods, nature is thus also portrayed as a hostile force that human beings were constantly obliged to fight for survival.

Conclusion: Reconstructing a Collective Japanese Identity

In returning to the ancient, Miyazaki appears to offer a reconstructed collective conception of Japan. In this, he offers collective healing to a country that has been ravaged by influences beyond her borders. By reaching back to a mythic, premodern Japan — one ruled not by samurai or emperors but by forests, spirits, and powerful women — Miyazaki bypasses the layers of Americanization and postwar modernization to locate something he presents as enduringly and essentially Japanese. Whether or not such an essence truly exists, the film's extraordinary popular success suggests that it spoke to a genuine and widely felt longing for cultural grounding in a time of profound national disorientation.

Sources

Morris-Suzuki, T. (1998). Re-Inventing Japan: Time, Space, Nation. Armonk, NY: ME Sharpe.

Napier, Susan J. Anime: From Akira to Howl's Moving Castle. Experiencing Contemporary Japanese Animation.

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