Based on a very British novel by Joan G Robinson and transposed, via Japan’s legendary animators Studio Ghibli, to a sleepy seaside town in Hokkaido, this beguiling, bittersweet tale has a bruised maturity that some of the more overtly fantastic Ghibli stories are lacking.
The protagonist, Anna, is a teenage girl poised at that vulnerable, half-formed moment in life when every casual cruel word hits like a poisoned dart. Sickly and silent, she is sent for the summer to a foster family. It is there that she meets Marnie, the golden-haired girl who lives in a seemingly abandoned mansion across the bay. The connection between them is instant – Anna has at last found a friend. But Marnie is as elusive as a shadow. And it is a friendship that is not without jealousy, tension and misunderstanding. At times, it feels more of a romantic entanglement than a platonic one, although given later revelations, it is unlikely that this reading is the intended one. The theme of a lonely child and a supernatural companion is a popular one in animation. There are parallels with Coraline, and with the Ghibli production Spirited Away. While Marnie lacks the densely mystical, immersive quality of Ghibli at its best, the film features characteristically exquisite hand-drawn animation and a sensitivity to the precarious, friable quality in an adolescent girl’s self-worth.
