BEGIN:VCALENDAR VERSION:2.0 PRODID:-//InvisionCommunity Events 4.7.23//EN METHOD:PUBLISH CALSCALE:GREGORIAN REFRESH-INTERVAL:PT15M X-PUBLISHED-TTL:PT15M X-WR-CALNAME:RMWorkCalendar NAME:RMWorkCalendar BEGIN:VTIMEZONE TZID:Europe/London TZURL:http://tzurl.org/zoneinfo/Europe/London X-LIC-LOCATION:Europe/London BEGIN:DAYLIGHT TZOFFSETFROM:+0000 TZOFFSETTO:+0100 TZNAME:BST DTSTART:20250330T020000Z RRULE:FREQ=YEARLY;BYMONTH=3;BYDAY=-1SU END:DAYLIGHT BEGIN:STANDARD TZOFFSETFROM:+0100 TZOFFSETTO:+0000 TZNAME:GMT DTSTART:20251026T020000Z RRULE:FREQ=YEARLY;BYMONTH=10;BYDAY=-1SU END:STANDARD END:VTIMEZONE BEGIN:VEVENT SUMMARY:Malintrashadowmoon 2025 BDay gift 04/25/2025 DTSTAMP:20250425T072606Z SEQUENCE:0 UID:256-5-c3fe8195a3dde498d013e477e2142422@aalbc.com ORGANIZER;CN="richardmurray":troy@aalbc.com DESCRIPTION:\n Malintrashadowmoon 2025 BDay gift 04/25/2025\n https://ww w.deviantart.com/hddeviant/art/Malintrashadowmoon-2025-BDay-gift-118717803 0\n\n\n\n \n\n \n\n\n\n IN AMENDMENT\n\n\n\n  \n\n\n\n Princess Mononoke: More Relevant Than Ever\n\n froom The soak\n\n https://www.youtube.com/wa tch?v=gUoLoNFidik\n\n\n\n  \n\n\n\n \n\n\n\n TRANSCRIPT\n\n\n\n 0:07\nto search for evil with eyes unclouded to me this line is both the essence of \n0:12\nStudio jibles Princess monoke and the most profound takeaway that I had from the film I think the movie's most\n0:18\nobvious message is the stuff about how we treat nature and how we should better live in harmony with it but I have no\n0:25\ninterest in talking about that not because it 's not relevant or important but because I think everybody has talked\n0:3 1\nabout that to death already in this video I want to talk to you about a nother message entirely one that I had\n0:37\nmissed until recently the ab ility to see with eyes unclouded by hate or more\n0:42\nspecifically to le arn to see the goodness in others even when it seems like they're not on y our side I doubt\n0:48\nwhen hay Miyazaki made princess monoke in 1997 tha t he could have predicted the age of social media tribalism and\n0:55\npol itical turmoil that we find ourselves in in the 2020s but the film explore s all these ideas in the complex subtle\n1:03\nyet pointed and sometimes i nscrutable way that all jibli films explore their themes watching and rewa tching the film\n1:10\ntoday I was surprised by how the struggles of the p rotagonist Ashi taka act as an incredible parallel for the\n1:15\njourney we all have to navigate in the Modern Age and it gave me a lot to reflect on how we can do it to learn to\n1:22\nnavigate a divided world with eyes unclouded now don't get me wrong this is not going to be a video essay tha t's\n1:28\njust an allegory for Centric is M or that both sides any issue are bad and that we should sit on the fence I think\n1:34\nto read the fil m that way would be wrong and we'll talk about how the real message is so much more profound and\n1:40\nrelatable than that in fact there's lessons in here about class Warfare dehumanization and how even in a bleak\n1:47\n world we must find the value in life stuff that hit me so much harder than \n1:52\nwhen I watched the film when I was younger so let's take a look at Studio ji's monoke Hime a film whose English\n1:59\ntranslated title of P rincess monoke is in of itself a misunderstanding of what the film is tryi ng to say because I\n2:05\nthink there's a lot we can learn from its chara cters even today about what it means to navigate a broken world at more\n2 :12\nwith itself [Music]\nPart One: To See With Unclouded Eyes\n2:26\n[Mus ic] the context of this quote to see with eyes unclouded comes from fairly early\n2:34\non in the film ashitaka who has just reluctantly killed the bore God turn demon that was threatening his village\n2:40\nfinds himself cursed and The Village's Oracle tells him that this curse will likely kill him but there is a chance\n2:47\nthat there could be a cure if he travels far to the west where the boore and the source of the curse came from it is\n2:54\nduring this section that she tells him that on his journey he mu st search for evil with eyes unclouded\n3:00\nthe reason I think this line is so important is that it sets up the theme for the entire rest of the f ilm at least\n3:06\nin terms of what Ashi taka's approach and philosophy i s throughout the movie people will constantly try to pull Ashi\n3:13\ntaka to one side or the other and they will frequently question his Allegiance multiple times a character asks out loud\n3:19\ntowards ashitaka whose si de are you on and time and time again he defies that\n3:25\ncategorization he helps one faction then the other and no one can quite figure him out t his is why for some people I\n3:31\nthink it's easy to read this as a meta phor for essentially a both sides approach to life both sides are bad\n3:3 8\ntherefore I won't pick a side but again I think it's a lot more interes ting than that it's not that ashitaka just refuses\n3:45\nto pick sides he refuses to see sides in the first place to me that is the\n3:50\nprecient message of the film that is so applicable to a society that seems so divi ded today in the age of social media\n3:57\nwe'll explore this idea at len gth later in the video rather than get too abstract too quickly\n4:02\nlet 's first talk through some key scenes in the film then I'll explain how I interpret them the first important scene\n4:08\nfor me at least in terms o f ashitaka's philosophy comes when he arrives at the Iron Works and he mee ts lady eboshi at\n4:15\nthis point in the film he's just saved two reside nts of the Iron Works from certain death and carries them all the\n4:20\nw ay back here in a pseudo mystical Journey to the dear God's Woods I think pretty quickly on arriving at the Iron\n4:26\nWorks ashitaka realizes that the thing he's searching for is here he's looking for the source of the i ron musket pellet\n4:33\nthat came from the body of the bore God who curse d him and he hopes that finding the source and dealing with it in some\n4: 39\nway might lift the curse that plagues him he talks to Lady eboshi The Matriarch who runs the Ironworks and\n4:46\nexplains why he's here she ask s him if you find the source of this pellet what will you do and it is her e that ashitaka\n4:53\nrepeats that Central quote that I spoke about earli er and in doing so sets up the philosophy he will adhere to in the\n5:00\n entire film he tells her that I will see with eyes unclouded and decide he aring\n5:06\nthis lady eosi laughs and guides ashitaka to her inner sanctu m sharing with him what she says is her Greatest\n5:12\nSecret she shows h im the place where she's having guns and weaponry made and here she confes ses that it was she that\n5:17\nshot the pet that corrupted the Bor God an d it is at this point that we get the first of many moral dilemmas for\n5: 23\nashitaka and where we can start to paint a really fascinating picture of what we can learn from the film in initially we\n5:30\nsee that ashitak a is full of rage and he wants to condemn Lady eboshi this is such a beaut iful and complex moment the\n5:37\nkind that appears so often in ji films because there's so many reasons and emotions at play here for our\n5:42\np rotagonist firstly I think the very Way Lady abushi lives takes off ashita ka he\n5:48\nis a member of the Mishi tribe in fact not just a member but the prince the emishi live in harmony with their\n5:54\nenvironment and do their best to respect nature when the bore God Appears outside the villag e Ashi Taka first instinct is\n6:00\nto simply try and reason with it he b egs the Bor God to quell its rage and calm down to leave the village in pe ace for\n6:07\nthey mean him no harm but when it's clear that the God is a bout to attack and kill some of the girls from the\n6:12\nvillage includin g ashitaka's sister only then as a last resort does he strike and\n6:17\nt ake down the boar but even after this the Oracle of the village arrives an d treats the boar god with respect doing a\n6:24\nlittle ritual and tellin g him that they will erect a monument in his honor here because they bear him no ill will and\n6:29\nthey hope he will do the same for them so I thi nk on a philosophical level ashitaka finds ibushi's way of life to\n6:35\n be abhorent not only does she confessed to killing the bore Spirit but she very casually tells the tale of how she\n6:41\nburned down half the fores t and took over this area to mass-produce her iron with which she seeks to take over the\n6:47\ncountry this is the complete opposite of the way the emishi live but there's more than that there's also a personal\n6:53\ngri evance here from ashitaka because it is eos's actions that directly led to him being cursed and you can see a\n6:59\nvindictive anger in him here wh ere maybe he just wants revenge for giving him this curse that might well kill him and\n7:06\nfinally of course there's the actual curse ashitaka's arm Bubbles and boils to life threatening to act on its own to\n7:13\ndraw his blade and strike down neosi the curse itself is demanding retribution \n7:19\nshe asks him your right hand wants to kill me and then must it kil l us all to\n7:24\nfind peace but ashitaka resists he holds down his arm b ecause he doesn't want to be this kind of person and this is when\n7:31\nt he idea of seeing with eyes unclouded will really manifest during this ten se confrontation one of the other people in\n7:37\nthe room speaks up beca use this inner sanctuary of eois is home to a few dozen outcasts who suffe r from leprosy and who\n7:44\nare the ones who design and make ibushi's we apons one of them speaks up and he says a beautiful line young man\n7:51\n he says I too am cursed I understand your rage and grief the leper relates to\n7:56\nashitaka and he tells him that while his anger is just ified he should not see Lady eboshi as an evil person he tells\n8:03\nashitaka abo ut how lady eboshi is the only person who ever saw the lepers as people an d treated them with respect\n8:10\ntending to them and washing and bandagi ng them herself While others shunn them and then he says a line that\n8:16 \nreally hits home for me and is another theme that we will investigate in the last section of this video he says life\n8:22\nis suffering and pain the world and its people are cursed but still we wish to\n8:28\nlive heari ng all this both ashitaka and we the audience are reminded that people are not just one thing they are not\n8:34\nstraightforwardly evil or straight forwardly good they are complex creatures for all her greed destruction\n8 :41\nand lack of sanctity for the natural world lady abushi is also kind g entle and empathetic she looks after not only\n8:48\nthe lepers but in the first scene that we meet her she's considerate towards the villagers too she knows them all by\n8:55\nname apologizes for the harm that comes to th em and is thankful that they are okay when she sees that ashitaka has\n9:0 0\ncarried them back after this scene with the lepers ashitaka walks aroun d the rest of the settlement and he sees the\n9:06\nwomen working in the F orge even helping them with their work he talks to them and they tell him about how Lady eosi\n9:13\ntreats them earlier when ashitaka is talking to the men in the tavern we learn that anytime lady eosi encounters\n9:18\na woman who is being enslaved she frees them and gives them work in the Iro n Works while a few of the men Express\n9:25\nthat the women here are a bi t spoiled ashitaka replies that a good V has happy women what he means by that I think\n9:32\nwhether consciously or subconsciously is that a good p lace is one where even the most marginalized and endangered people\n9:38\n are happy and protected and so to confirm this for himself Ashi taka later \n9:43\nasked the ladies of the forge is life hard here and they tell them that it is but it's far better than life anywhere\n9:50\nelse they do hav e to work long days but they're well-looked after and the men here behave themselves it is through\n9:56\nthese encounters that ashitaka learned som ething really important something that is Central to the idea of seeing\n1 0:01\nwith eyes unclouded he learns that even a place that can produce evi l in the form of weapons and destruction can also\n10:07\nbe a place that produces so much goodness the Iron Works are both a weapons Factory that d esecrates its\n10:13\nenvironment but also egalitarian Utopia where everyo ne is able to live with happiness and respect no matter their\n10:19\nback ground gender or disability if Ashi taka was more straightforward if this was a different film with a different\n10:25\nmessage he might just have c ome in killed lady eosi and acted the Vengeance that his curse demands an eye for an eye\n10:33\nbut seeing with eyes unclouded means recognizing bo th the good and the evil in something without preconceived bias\n10:40\nev en if he doesn't agree with how eboshi lives her life and runs the Iron Wo rks he can't deny that she's made something\n10:45\nvaluable and worth pro tecting as I mentioned in the intro I think this is the most profound mess age of the film\n10:52\nthere is always more to a situation that meets the eye and we can only see that when we put aside our hate I think we\n10:58 \ncan confirm this by looking at another quote that actually comes directl y from the film's maker hay Miyazaki who is\n11:05\nquoted as saying the f ollowing you must see with eyes unclouded by hate see the\n11:10\ngood in that which is evil and the evil in that which is good pledge yourself to n either side but vow instead to preserve\n11:17\nthe balance that exists be tween the two now problematically I was not able to find the direct source of this quote\n11:24\nlots of websites attribute this as a quote from Miy azaki but don't site where he actually said it but if we trust that\n11:30 \nthis is a real quote I think it does resonate a lot with ashitaka's appr oach in the film this philosophy of seeing\n11:36\ngood and evil and evil in that which is good I think speaks to a cultural difference too it is ve ry much in line\n11:42\nwith Shintoism and Buddhist beliefs which I think can feel a bit foreign or Mystic to many in the west where\n11:47\nindivid ual action and oppositional factions are a lot more common as I've spoken about in previous videos but\n11:54\nregardless I think it's an idea that is equally relevant today in a world that seems so thoroughly divided on s o many\n12:00\nfronts being able to see the value in things that on the su rface don't seem to be on your side is something so vital\n12:06\nand impo rtant for us to do but I also think both we and the film can go much deepe r because I don't think any of this\n12:13\nmeans that we should arbitrari ly stay in the middle of any dispute or that there isn't a right or a wron g that we should\n12:18\nadhere to it's actually about making sure we find the right by looking for it with unbiased or unclouded eyes and the\n12:2 6\nreal profound Insight that I felt from watching the film and thinking a lot about it is that actually there are no\n12:32\nsides both in the movi e and in our lives and even when there are sides it's people being pushed to fight each other\n12:38\nfor misguided reasons it's parties who actuall y have a shared goal and are not realizing it I think ashitaka is the\n12: 45\nonly person in the film who realizes this at least until the end and t o illustrate what I mean and elaborate on\n12:51\nthat further let's pick up where we left off in the film because not long after the conversations ashitaka has with\n12:56\neboshi the Iron Works is under attack by none ot her than son the mon noime of\n13:02\nthe title son breaks into the Iron W orks makes her way to where eboshi is and risks her life to try and kill h er eosi\n13:09\nin turn tries to shoot down son with guns and it culminate s in the two having a sort of intense Street KN fight once\n13:16\nagain w hat's fascinating is that both sides of this confrontation are justified i n their beliefs and abushi\n13:22\neven acknowledges it when son is stood on the roof eosi calls out to her and says you seek Vengeance for your tri be\n13:29\nwell there are some here who seek Vengeance for their husbands killed by your wolves this sets up another theme\n13:34\nin the film The i dea of a cycle of hatred it's a vicious cycle where one grievance justifie s another and then\n13:40\nanother in return till no one can remember wher e it started but both sides feel grieved and justified in their\n13:47\npu rsuit of Vengeance son and her wolves killed the loved ones of the people in the iron works but those people burned\n13:52\nthe forest and killed ot her spirit gods but those gods were stopping the villagers from getting na tural resources\n13:58\nthey needed and so on and so forth the buck can al ways be passed one further step back but the end result is a\n14:05\ndestr uction of both sides and we can see that literally as s and neosi fight to \n14:10\nthe death both ready to die in the pursuit of destroying the othe r ashitaka\n14:15\nhowever is the only one capable of seeing that this cyc le of hatred will never end like this he yells at s first\n14:22\nand then eosi and her people to stop the fighting but when it's clear that no one will listen he is forced to physically\n14:28\nstep this is where you can see the curse flare up and manifest because the curse\n14:34\nis born from Rage and hatred and it's fueled by the resentment and Malice that all the people present are holding for\n14:40\none another ashitaka physically wa lks in between eboshi and Son telling them there is a demon inside you and her then\n14:47\nhe turns to everyone else and tells them to look at the bitterness and hatred that curses him what he's trying to\n14:53\nexplain to everyone is that this demon is there within all of us whether literally as in his case or\n14:59\nmetaphorically as in the case of son and neosi the demon is the hatred and resentment it is the anger and the\n15:06\nmal ice that we all hold and he desperately implores everyone that they should n't give into it what he wants is\n15:12\nfor people to strive to see thin gs with unclouded eyes to see that nature and humans can live in harmony b ut\n15:18\nunfortunately for ashitaka and for everyone in the film The Mes sage falls on deaf ears eosi and Son don't listen\n15:25\nand ashitaka is forced to physically subdue them as he tries to carry son out one of the l adies of the Iron Works\n15:30\ndraws her weapon on him she threatens to s hoot ashitaka and her justification is so interesting because she simply s ays\n15:37\nyou hurt lady eosi and in return comes this look oh This brill iant look I feel\n15:43\nlike I've never seen disappointment better shown on screen without a word being said than this ashitaka simply\n15:49\nlook s back at this woman with eyes that just kind of speak for him as if to sa y you still don't get it despite\n15:55\neverything I'm telling you and sh owing you you're still going to say that because saying you hurt lady abos i so\n16:00\nthoroughly misses the point of what ashitaka was trying to il lustrate yes he hurt lady abushi but that is the point\n16:07\nthat there' s always a step back he could turn and say well I only hurt lady eboshi be cause she was going to hurt son\n16:13\nand then eosi would say well I was only going to hurt son because she was going to hurt me and so on and so forth the\n16:19\ncycle of hatred it can never be broken by more hatred mo re anger more Vengeance\n16:25\ncannot stop the destruction only a genuine attempt to look Beyond it to forgive where possible and make amends\n16:3 1\nwhere it's not that is the only way anyone here can move past it but th is lady refuses to see it and while she\n16:38\ndoesn't try to shoot ashit aka her gun accidentally goes off and hits him directly in the back this o f course will\n16:44\nkick off a different section of the film where Ashi taka will now spend his time in the forest with son but before we\n16:50\n talk about her I want to reiterate something that I spoke about earlier I don't think the message of the film is that ashitaka is not picking aside\ n16:57\nthat's certainly not the message of what I'm saying what I think i s profound about what ashitaka does is that he's the only one\n17:02\nwho sees that there are no sides because as everyone realizes at the end of th e film the humans in the forest can live\n17:08\nin harmony ashitaka's emi shi tribe is proof of this these sides can work\n17:14\ntogether they're j ust so blinded by their rage that they can't see that the dear God who is Central to the film is\n17:20\nthe perfect representation of this idea tha t there can be a balance and Harmony between seemingly oppositional forces \n17:26\nbecause he is both life and death and yet so many characters don' t see that the bores for example are angry at\n17:33\nthe dear God because they think the dear God is only supposed to protect the forest when son b rings the injured\n17:39\nashitaka to him the dear God heals him but didn' t heal Nago the boore that eventually became the cursed demon which\n17:46 \nupsets the boore tribe to them the dear God should be picking sides he's supposed to be about life and protection\n17:52\nfor the forest so why di d he not help one of them and then goes and helps a human meanwhile the hu mans only see the\n17:59\ndear God as the source of death and danger in fa ct I think one of the most profound illustrations of this comes\n18:05\nri ght at the end of the film from a very small easily missed line after a dr amatic climax where their dear God is\n18:11\nshot and killed by aosi he t hen transforms into a vengeful version of the night walker and nearly dest roys the\n18:16\nentire forest in pursuit of his head finally when his hea d is given back by ashitaka andan he collapses into the\n18:23\nwater brin ging with him a wave of healing and regrowth before seemingly dying it is that this point that koroku\n18:30\none of the villagers says aloud I didn 't know the dear God makes the flowers bloom to me this represents the\n18 :36\nfundamental misunderstanding of the humans in the Ironworks you can s ee it as misinformation you can see it as\n18:42\npropaganda or you can se e it as simple ignorance but they don't actually understand what the dear God or the\n18:48\nforest does we'll talk about specifically eboshi later but as a whole the people at the ironwork seem to have\n18:54\nthis mistak en belief the forest is only a place of danger to them what they don't rea lize is that the dear God is\n19:00\nlife as much as it is death it is not one side it is not either or it is both\n19:07\nthis is what ashitaka see s and understands throughout the film and what we can all learn from on th e flip side s\n19:14\ndoesn't understand this either because she says that even restored these are not the dear God's Woods their dear God\n19:20\ni s dead once again it is ashitaka who is the only one able to see the truth and he says that the dear God cannot ever\n19:27\ndie because he is both life and death and that in this act of regrowth he's\n19:32\ntelling us al l to live this is another theme we will explore in the final section of th is video about the value of\n19:37\nlife itself but before we talk about t hat let's elaborate more about s's behavior and attitude because like\n19: 44\nalmost every other human in the film she too is unable to let go of he r hatred in order to see the truth in front of\n19:53\nher one of the cent ral questions about son in the film is who and what is she\nPart Two: Who Is Mononoke-Hime\n19:59\nthere's ambiguity about her identity itself but a lso is she human wolf or\n20:05\nsomething else entirely again she views h erself as part of a binary a wolf\n20:10\nfighting against humans but othe rs also view her binarily when lady eosi first\n20:15\ndescribes son she s ays that she is a girl whose Soul the Wolves stole and she thinks that if she destroys the forest\n20:22\nit will break their hold on son and she'll go back to being a normal human this is probably a good point to talk\n20 :28\nabout the of the film that I promised I'd explain because the origina l title of the film in Japanese is monoke Hime\n20:35\nwhich actually tran slates to monster princess this is actually the title that the residents o f the Iron Works give her\n20:41\nso what it speaks to is how they view bo th her and the spirits monsters now\n20:47\nwhether she is the princess of the monsters a monstrosity of a princess or a princess belonging to the m onsters it\n20:53\nis a pejorative term they attach to her the English tra nslated title of princess monoke Ashley misses a subtle but\n21:00\nimport ant part of this description because princess monoke just sounds like a na me like that's what this character\n21:05\nis called but she is son she ha s a name it's just that the people of the Ironworks either never got a cha nce to\n21:12\nlearn it or never bothered to and their referral to her and the spirits as monsters says more about their approach\n21:19\nthan her r eality in fact it's interesting that when they first encounter ashitaka th ey fear he might be\n21:25\na monster too in this scene as ashitaka is car rying Koro Who and the other villager he's rescued back to the Iron\n21:31 \nWorks these guys sitting by the river see them approaching and one of th em says the phrase Mona now monoke means\n21:38\nmonster as we've discusse d and the C indicates a question so he could be asking if it's a monster i n general\n21:45\nthat's approaching or you could be worried that monoke h ee is approaching either way it represents his paranoia\n21:52\nanything c oming from the woods is a monster to him even though it's three people two of whom are his own friends\n21:58\nall of this is to say that the villag ers have a one-dimensional view of son and she has a one-dimensional view of\n22:04\nherself son refuses to accept herself as a human and in fact he r stance at the end of the film is telling and how she\n22:11\nrefuses to grow as a character over the course of the film one of jbl's rare prominen t female characters to do so\n22:17\nafter the dear God's head has been re turned and order is somewhat restored son turns to Ashi taka and says I lo ve\n22:23\nyou ashitaka but I cannot forgive the human race and so the two come to an agreement that ashitaka will help the\n22:29\npeople of the Ir on Works rebuild a better home something we'll talk about soon while son w ill remain in the forest\n22:34\nwith the Wolves and the two can meet when ever they want now of course what son is saying is equal parts\n22:40\nund erstandable but equal parts ridiculous it is understandable that she's unh appy with what the people of the Iron Works particularly lady eboshi\n22:4 7\ndid in terms of killing the deer God or at least his corporeal body but son is\n22:53\nalso being a massive hypocrite firstly she says she cannot forgive the human race but of course she doesn't include\n22:59\nashitaka in that she loves him and she's able to separate him from the idea of hum anity but even more hypocritically\n23:06\nshe's excluding herself from th is distinction too she's giving herself a benefit of the doubt that she re fuses to\n23:12\nextend to any of the iron work's residents she recognizes that she and ashitaka might be human beings that are\n23:18\nable to live respectfully and harmoniously with the forest but she Paints the rest of the entire human race with one brush condemning them as\n23:25\nessentiall y evil and incapable of Behaving well this again really spoke to me as a l ine of thinking that so many\n23:31\npeople still use today to tarnish ent ire groups of people as dangerous and irredeemable whether that's immigran ts\n23:37\nor trans people or whoever is so fundamentally wrong especially when that characteristic is innate not based on\n23:43\nthe evidence of t heir behavior like being human for example the vast majority of the people of the Ironworks\n23:49\nare just trying to live their lives and doing wh at they're told you can argue that eosi is the villain that s views\n23:55 \nall of humanity to be and we'll talk about her soon I promise but you ca n't say the same for the rest of everyone\n24:00\nelse they're no more at fault for what happened than a random boar from the forest is and yet in h er stubbornness\n24:06\nand petulance son refuses to see that Nuance now y ou might argue that she doesn't view herself as human but I\n24:13\nthink clearly on some level she knows she is if she didn't she wouldn't be in lo ve with ashitaka she wouldn't react\n24:19\nthe way she does when he calls her beautiful everyone even the forest Spirits know that she is human the y just\n24:26\naccept her regardless right after the scene where ashitaka carries her out of the Iron Works one of the monkey Spirits\n24:31\nsays w olf girl not care wolf girl human when talking to S which anger one of her \n24:37\nWolf brothers and he threatens to bite the monkey's head off this shows us that everyone here is aware of the reality of\n24:43\nwhat son i s her brothers are sensitive because they don't want her to feel different to them but she is Morrow\n24:50\nacknowledges this too when she's talkin g about son with ashitaka ashitaka demands that son be freed because she i s human\n24:57\nto which Morrow barks fact that she is neither human nor w olf and calls her my\n25:02\npoor ugly lovely daughter Maro in fact holds a similar style of thinking to s\n25:07\nin that she too sees things as op positional Maro dismissively asks will you join s and fight the humans Nas hi\n25:15\ntaka replies that no that will only breed more hatred which goe s back to this idea of the cycle of hatred that we\n25:21\nspoke about ear lier which ashitaka is right in asserting cannot be broken with more hatre d then when ashitaka asks her\n25:28\ncan't the humans in the forest live in peace Mora replies that nowhere is safe as long as humans are around ag ain she\n25:35\ndoesn't believe this about son or even ashitaka but spous it as fact regardless\n25:40\nshowing how she like son refuses to accept c omplexity rather than binaries\n25:46\nand here there's also a fascinating parallel with what she says about son's relationship with the forest with what\n25:51\neosi said Morrow says that s is now tied to the forest and t hat if the forest\n25:56\ndies s will die too this is the actual opposite of what eashi says if you remember who claims\n26:03\nthat destroying the forest will actually liberate son ultimately maybe they are both right and wrong because if the\n26:09\nforest dies maybe monoke Heime the child of the Wolves will die but perhaps s the\n26:15\nhuman will be freed either w ay the fact that they both make this claim confidently shows how they are not\n26:21\nviewing things with unclouded eyes but rather through their bi ased lenses as it happens the forest isn't destroyed it's\n26:28\nsaved an dan chooses to forsake Humanity displaying an inability to view the world with the nuance and unclouded eyes\n26:35\nthat ashitaka has been doing an d asking for others to do too funnily enough there is one woman who he doe s get\n26:41\nthrough to by the end of the film lady eosi after son's decl aration that she cannot forgive humans we then shortly\n26:48\ncut to lady eosi talking to her people she remarks that she can't believe she was car ried to safety by a wolf of all\n26:55\nthings then she says that the peop le of the Iron Works will start over but that we will build a good Village here\n27:02\nsuggesting that she wants to build a better home this time t o me I think that's a pretty clear indicator from her\n27:08\nespecially i n light of those two lines coming back to back that eboshi has seen that s he can in fact live in harmony\n27:14\nwith the forest that the wolves are not an evil force they're just living creatures trying to protect what th ey\n27:19\nhold precious and that she can build a version of the Iron Work s that doesn't desecrate or seek to destroy the forest\n27:26\nthis is als o why I think ashitaka chooses to stay because he also believes that it ca n be done that the humans can\n27:32\nrebuild in a way that resembles how his Mishi Clan live in harmony with the world around them now as for eosi there\n27:39\nis another theme I want to talk about one that is definitely not explicit in the film but stood out to me as a great\n27:45\nmetaphor for how the world works today and that is the lies of the 1% screwing\n27: 50\nover the rest of the\nPart Three: The Lies of the 1\n27:55\n99 as I've mentioned earlier in the video ashitaka is Keen to emphasize that there a re no sides to this situation and\n28:02\neveryone can live harmoniously b ut on the occasions that there are sides it's\n28:07\nthe wrong people bei ng pit against each other and perhaps the biggest example of this is lady eboshi now don't get me\n28:14\nwrong ibushi is not a victim or some innoc ent Damsel in Distress quite the opposite she's shown to be ruthless cold\ n28:21\nwhen needed and deeply ambitious she half jokingly half seriously declares her desire to rule the entire our\n28:28\ncountry but as we've di scussed she's a nuanced character who is kind gentle and\n28:33\nNoble at times as well her beef with the forest Spirits though is largely based on misinformation and ignorance like I\n28:40\nmentioned earlier where she se ems to believe that not only is the dear God a threat and a source of deat h but also\n28:45\nthat killing the forest will restore son back to her hu man self at one point she even posits that the blood of the dear\n28:52\nG od is set to cure any illness and she could use it to cure the lepers that she houses of their condition\n28:58\nthe people of the Iron Works don't realize that the dear God also brings life and provides the resources that \n29:04\nthey're using and the person seeking to exploit this ignorance is the character of Goo the reason I want to talk about\n29:10\nthe 1% and t he 99% in this section is because goo is very directly the voice\n29:16\na nd the will of the emperor in princess monoke in this scene he comes to eb oshi\n29:21\nand shows her a letter from the emperor that demands that she kill the dear God and bring his head to him eboshi is\n29:28\ninitially r eluctant and feels like the iron production is going well enough but Joo s oftly threatens her that all the\n29:34\nmen they've supplied her with wer en't just sent to get iron and you can see his expression change from seri ous to\n29:40\nthe fake innocent that he pretends to be as he adds or at l east that's what his majesty would say all of this is a\n29:47\nreminder t hat not only can he take ibushi's resources away but he can use those very men against her but funnily\n29:54\nenough one sentence later when eboshi questions of the emperor believes that the deer God's head will give him\ n29:59\nimmortality jico claims oh I don't know what the emperor thinks th is is of course a direct contradiction to what he\n30:06\njust said and it reveals J's true nature and purpose he's here to get what he wants one wa y or the other it's clear\n30:13\nthat jico is a substitute for the empero r acting as a force of coercion that makes the central conflict arise in\n 30:19\nthe film and we can see that coercion not just from the verbal and financial threats but also before this scene J has\n30:26\na horde of goon s that he brings with him he tells them to hide and wait for him which is to imply that if eboshi didn't\n30:33\nwillingly agree to kill the dear Go d he'd make her do it by force and eboshi\n30:38\nunderstands this because right after agreeing to kill the dear God she tells jico that he can summ on that shady Bunch\n30:44\nhidden under the cliff and joico simply laughs with this fake innocent expression again and says oh you saw\n30:50\nthem did you what all of this shows us is that eosi is aware of the threat tha t jico brings with him for her own part\n30:57\nshe's ly fighting a war wi th a human the nobleman Lord asano who's trying to steal the Iron Works fr om her not only\n31:04\nis this guy a wealthy powerful Samurai but he's al so a bit of a scumbag because we learned through dialogue that he\n31:10\n tried to conquer this area himself and was driven back by the Boors but no w that eboshi has managed to conquer it\n31:16\nhe's demanding that she gi ve him half again under the threat of violence so if\n31:21\ntaking the we alth from someone else's labor without doing anything of your own isn't a Marxist allegory I don't know\n31:27\nwhat is it's all subplot so none of the following is discussed explicitly but it feels pretty clear to me that eboshi is\n31:33\nessentially caught in a tough political sandwich on the one hand she has a wealthy established Noble trying to\n31:39\nforcibly t ake her business and it's not a stretch to say that this guy likely has th e emperor's favor whereas the\n31:45\nupstart woman in neosi probably does n't on the other side she has J requesting\n31:50\nbut really demanding as we've seen that she go to kill the dear God in the emperor's name and of course the minute\n31:57\nshe goes off to to do so and leaves the Iron Wor ks relatively unguarded Lord oano attacks with his army you have to\n32:03 \nwonder where would he have gotten this information from that the Iron Wo rks are currently unguarded I think it's almost\n32:09\ncertain that jico is pulling the strings on this getting everything he and by extension the emperor wants which is the\n32:15\ndear God's death the appeasement of one of his Nobles and the removal of an ambitious Rogue element in abosi J in \n32:23\nfact actually directly tells eboshi there is no time to fight men just give a all the Iron Works fulfill your\n32:30\npromise to the empero r so it's pretty clear that he doesn't care what happens to her and later when they're in the\n32:35\nforest one of his Scouts asks if they really e ven need eosi and J declares quietly that when it comes to hunting a\n32:4 2\ngod they should let her do the dirty work so all of this is to say that while eosi is herself ambitious and dangerous\n32:49\nit's clear that she 's being manipulated and coerced by a higher authority who arbitrarily cre ates the conflict between\n32:55\nthe Iron Works and the dear God for his own ends in fact everything in the film is basically a consequence of J's\ n33:01\nactions first in the town when he first meets Ashi taka he is the one who convinces everyone that the little gold\n33:07\npellet that ashita ka gives the woman in exchange for rice is super valuable but\n33:12\nhe d oes so in such a loud and obvious way that it inevitably draws the attenti on of everyone around including\n33:18\nthese people who want to Rob ashit aka and then conveniently jico is there again to war Nashi taka and run aw ay\n33:25\nwith him was this all part of his plan possibly he then tells a shitaka to go to\n33:30\nthe Iron Works and the dear God's Forest to find the answers he's looking for again to me at least the class parallel\n33:3 6\nis pretty clear despite him being an Envoy of the emperor J manages to convince everyone in this little village\n33:42\nthat this humble traveler from a remote tribe is somehow super wealthy and turns them against him w hile hiding his own\n33:49\npower and Status constantly both here and late r he's peing people against each other to mask his own ends and if we\n33: 55\ncontinue down the idea that he's essentially a substitute for the Empe ror then this is a pretty clear and I'd argue astute metaphor for a class\ n34:02\nstruggle and the way in which the truly wealthy and Powerful manip ulate others into fighting for relative scraps while\n34:07\nthey get what they want once Chico reaches the Iron Works himself he specifically asks about ashitaka and if\n34:14\nabosi has seen him presumably because he wan ts to use Ashi taka again to which aboshi replies that he came and went\n3 4:20\nalready and I'm finally and perhaps most tellingly there's this line he says when the hunt for the dear God is taking\n34:26\nplace ashitaka h aving seen the Iron Works is already under attack goes to find ioshi he fi nds the men from the\n34:32\nIron Works who describe the horrors of what's just happened including how they were used as human Shields Joo and his\n 34:39\ncrew had planted bombs and grenades underneath where the men of the Iron Works were told to hold the line and\n34:44\nwhen the bores approach ed the bombs were set off and all lives were lost human\n34:50\nand animal J's plan clearly did not care about collateral damage but ashitaka\n34:55 \nagain refusing to see sides rescues one of son's Wolf brothers from unde rneath the pile of bore corpses and even\n35:02\nconvinces the men of the Iron Works to help him do so I think it's really telling that when we see this first\n35:07\ninstance of the animals and the people of the Iron Work s working together it's J's guards who try to stop them again\n35:14\ntryi ng to keep the two sides divided but when they attack ashitaka it's the me n of the Iron Works who revolt and fight\n35:21\nback as they realize that the wolves are not their enemies rise up against your greedy overlords co mrades the men then\n35:27\nwork together to free the wolf and the Wolf in turn also doesn't show any hostility towards the workers once it's\n35:33 \nfreed and instead proceeds to guide ashitaka to where son is on the way ashitaka stops in front of eboshi and\n35:40\ntells her what's happening t hat the Iron Works under attack and that she should abandon her hunt for t he dear God you\n35:45\ncan see J's nervous expression here as if he's wor ried that he'll actually convince eboshi to stop doing his dirty\n35:51\nw ork for him she replies you want me to kill Samurai instead of the dear Go d to which ashitaka says no can't the forest\n35:58\nand the Iron Works li ve in peace and it's at this point that jico says a really telling line he says whose side\n36:05\nis he on this is a pretty clear distillation of t he point I've been building to here is ashitaka saying that\n36:10\nthe fo rest and the people can live in harmony once again it's not that he's not picking sides he refuses to see\n36:17\nsides and here is goo in return te lling him hey whose side are you want trying\n36:22\nto insist that there are in fact two binary factions that must try and destroy each other\n36:2 8\nbut we know he's wrong we've just seen ashitaka unite the two sides in a unified goal without hostility or\n36:35\nconflict but no matter what he claims J doesn't care about what happens to the people of the Ironworks a nd even the men\n36:41\nrealize that when ashitaka comes to find them and they say they're willing to sacrifice us all they're using lady\n36:47\neb oshi now thankfully eosi has an inherit distrust of men which she explicit ly States the ladies of the Iron\n36:53\nWorks she says she's more afraid of men than monsters and tells them to be on their guard while she's away and so Toki\n37:00\nand the others are able to fend off the attack on the Iron Works of course her and other lady's distrust of men is\n37:06\nvalid in the context of what they've been through but I also think it doubles a s a mistrust of hierarchy because eashi\n37:12\ndoesn't distrust ashitaka who she very quickly asked to join her cause after first meeting him nor d oes she distrust\n37:18\nher right-hand man but she does distrust Lord asa no and jico men with power and authority the 1% who are recklessly\n37:26\ nwilling to sacrifice lives to get whatever they want this is Illustrated in another really poignant line that\n37:31\njico says right to the end of the film here he's fleeing with the dear God's head even while watching t he entire\n37:37\nforest and Iron Works be destroyed by the way which real ly clear metaphor here guys San and ashitaka stop him and tell\n37:43\nhim to give the head back to which he says something that completely illustra tes his world view he says The\n37:49\nThirst to possess Heaven and Earth is what makes us human this is so interesting because it's demonstrably\n3 7:55\nuntrue here is goo standing in in front of two humans who clearly do not share this Instinct of his and yet he declares\n38:01\nso confidently that what he was doing was in fact human nature again to me\n38:06\nthis just speaks to joo's inherently manipulative nature where he's trying to c onvince everyone that they should all behave like him but Ashi taka and so n\n38:13\nrefus and they begrudgingly do get through the chico getting him to give up the head which they then take and return\n38:19\nto the dear G od all of this is to say that this is just another part of princess monoke that struck me as so\n38:25\nrelevant when watching it now in a time wher e the wealth divide between the richest and the poorest in society has\n38 :30\nonly grown in most of the western world for the last 50 plus years th e theme of the powerful minority manipulating the\n38:35\nmajority could n ot be more profound the tactics of misinformation misdirection and coercio n blaming a vulnerable group\n38:43\nfor problems they didn't cause these are all things that are probably even more true now than they were when th e film\n38:48\nreleased in 1997 but while this is a rather Bleak worldview and indeed it's a pretty\n38:53\nbrutal life depicted in Princess monoke there's also subtle optimism that permeates the film and that's the last\n 38:59\nthing I want to talk to you about because I think it's another thin g we could really do with hearing in the modern day that life may be hard but\n39:05\nit's worth [Music] living I've already spoken so far about\nPa rt Four: Life Is For Living\n39:11\nthe idea of seeing with eyes unclouded about not seeing ourselves or others as one-dimensional or as binary oppo sites\n39:18\nand of resisting the manipulations of the elite and Powerful but there is one other recurring message that appears\n39:24\nthroughout princess monoke and that is the idea that the world world is a cold bitter place but the value of life is\n39:30\nstill sacran and as long as we're alive we can make the world a better place\n39:36\nthere is lots of ambien t misery depicted throughout princess monoke the emishi tribe are dying ou t and now forced to\n39:42\ngive up their prince Samurai and natural disas ters are destroying Villages the forest gods are dying out and getting\n39 :48\nweaker and even the people of the Iron Works live difficult lives all of this while an outof of touch Emperor focuses\n39:55\non trying to find immortality but there there are also times when The Bleak state of the wo rld is made verbally\n40:00\nexplicit it first comes from jico when he's s itting down to talk with ashitaka for the first time remarking on the men\ n40:06\nwho were potentially looking to Rob ashitaka he says that it wasn' t always like this but that Hearts have grown\n40:11\ncold throughout the land he says that the area around here was a fine Village once but whether it was a flood or a\n40:17\nlandslide it was destroyed and now the land p resumbly referring to the country as a whole teams with bitter ghosts dead \n40:24\nfrom war sick or starved and Fallen where they stood a curse you say the\n40:30\nworld is a curse if you remember from earlier in the video this actually Echoes what the leper will say later in\n40:35\nthe Iron Wo rks that life is suffering in pain the world and its people are cursed but we still wish to live but notice\n40:42\nthat what the leper says and wha t Chico says as well end with slight optimism the world may be a curse but we still\n40:49\nwant to live as human beings and Cho has a similar philo sophy when he tells ashitaka that everyone dies some now\n40:55\nsome late r but the trick is to avoid the jaws of death or so his master used to say at this point ashitaka L man said I\n41:03\nshouldn't have gotten into th at fight I killed two men referring to the fact that as he was riding here he\n41:08\nencountered a samurai raid on a village and when they attacked him he was forced to defend himself and kill the two men\n41:14\nin the p rocess ashitaka feels guilt for this act but jico tells him hey you may ha ve killed those guys but you helped me\n41:21\nand others escape this is a reminder of course of the pragmatic worldview that the film espouses that life and death\n41:28\nare very closely related and indeed in this instan ce ashitaka's actions bring both death and life simultaneously much\n41:36 \nlike what the dear God does this little optimistic spin on things does s eem to get through to ashitaka and what we see\n41:42\nfor most of the res t of the film is that he spreads a rather hopeful message to everyone else that he meets and that's\n41:47\nsimply to live live just for the act of living and the value all life has but\n41:53\nalso because through living you can make the world a better place and also express your gratitude to t hose who have\n41:59\nsacrificed to get you here ashitaka does this both t hrough his actions and his words in his actions he's basically as\n42:06\n much of a pacifist as you could realistically be in the film at every occa sion before he enters a physical\n42:11\nconflict he beseeches the life in front of him to stop to not fight first he does it with the curse for Nag o\n42:18\nimploring him to quell his rage multiple times before he's final ly forced to strike when the demon is about to attack\n42:23\nother people with the aformentioned samurai who were attacking G and the others ashita ka again yells at them to\n42:30\nlet him pass it's only when they refuse and attack him does he fight back the same again happens twice more at the \n42:36\nclimax of the film first he's riding towards the Iron Works when Lord aso's invading Samurai spot him he again\n42:43\nimplores them to let him pass but they start firing on him regardless then a short while later they send Riders to\n42:49\nchase after him and again ashitaka implores t hem to put down their arms when it's clear that they won't he\n42:55\nshoo ts down one of the men but still lets the other one Escape so time and tim e again ashitaka avoids taking life\n43:02\nor even attempting to do so un less he absolutely has to and in the verbal message he gives to others he implores\n43:09\nthem to live when he carries son out of the Iron Works af ter her fight with eosi she questions why he helped her he says\n43:16\nI didn't want you to die to which son replies I'm not afraid to die if it wi ll drive away the humans this is another\n43:23\narea where the two of the m are philosophically Polar Opposites and Son shows an image maturity of a ttitude that\n43:28\nspeaks to someone who hasn't really gotten the chance to mature and develop as a person repeatedly son seems happy\n43:34\nto t hrow her life away for seemingly nothing she does this later as well when she charges in with a boes of the climax\n43:40\nof the film to attack Chi co in eos's encampment even though she admits it will be certain death but Ashi taka is\n43:46\nalways trying to get her to stop thinking like this even as son draws his blade against him and threatens to kill\n43:51\nashi taka he simply replies live before Rising her up by telling her that she's \n43:56\nbeautiful which completely throws her off guard partly because I think it reminds her of her Humanity I'll have to remember this\n44:03\nta ctic if an attractive woman ever points a sword at my throat at the end of the film when the dear God has seemingly died s says that all is lost\n44 :11\nbecause the dear God is dead to which ashitaka replies that the dear God cannot die for he is both life and death\n44:16\nand that through this Final Act he is telling us to live again this is a really optimistic mess age in a world\n44:23\nthat's so full of pain and misery as we've discusse d live because you're Alive live because you can do something\n44:29\nwith that life because giving up is not just illogical but flies in the face o f all of those who are dead who no doubt\n44:35\nwould have loved a chance to live longer themselves and that's what ashitaka's plan is at the end o f the film s just\n44:40\nRetreats back into the woods which is a great me taphor for how she hasn't grown at all throughout the film she just goes\n 44:46\nback to being the exact same person in the same location as before Ashi taka by comparison decides to live in the Iron\n44:52\nWorks to help them make a more ethical Society he could just as easily go back to the Mi shi tribe now that his curse is\n44:59\nlifted and return to the life he l ived before but that goes against his message live because you can still m ake this\n45:05\ncruel world a better place and that's what he plans to do in this new location indeed I think the wisest characters in\n45:11\nthe film shared this message again towards the end of the film koroku The Iron Works villager who ashitaka saved\n45:18\nwatches the fire envelop the Ir on Works and he says once the four stars to burn it's all over to which hi s wife Toki\n45:25\nreplies no it isn't we're still alive again like son k oroku is too concerned\n45:30\nwith the temporary and the physical if we l ose this material thing we lose it all what is the point of life without i t\n45:37\nbut Toki and ashitaka are there to act as reminders to them and us the audience that hey you're still alive aren't you\n45:44\nso nothing is lost because within you there's an infinite potential to make and creat e more things worth living for\n45:51\nand that's the note I'd like to end this video on because I do believe that it's a really valuable lesson for us to carry\n45:56\non into our lives amongst the many relevant contempor ary messages that I felt the film brings even today the\n46:02\nworld is a bleak place in our real lives too sometimes we're living through an era w here it feels like social progress\n46:08\nis going backwards more and mor e people are being made to suffer through exploitation and more than anyth ing\n46:14\npeople's empathy just seems to be fading the passive cruelty a nd vindictiveness of so many has been so starkly on\n46:20\ndisplay but ev en when it seems like all is lost it isn't because we are alive\n46:26\nan d with that life life we owe it to those who've lost Theirs to keep going and with this life comes endless\n46:32\npossibilities of things we can do to change the darkness around us to keep striving to make the world a bet ter\n46:37\nplace for all of us to live in and I hope by making this video and reaching out to you I've helped do so in some\n46:44\nsmall tiny way if you've made it all the way to the end of this video then please listen to\n46:50\njust one more thing easily the hardest part of making video ess ays like this one is the copyright is issues I won't\n46:57\ngo into too m any details so as to not bore you but media analysis like this is covered by a law called fair use which\n47:04\nallows the use of copyrighted conte nt for the purpose of transformative analysis however big media companies\ n47:11\nlove to abuse the power they have and make false copyright claims on videos like mine because well they can and\n47:18\nthere's no punishmen t for them what this means is that my videos are always at the risk of bei ng flagged temporarily\n47:23\ntaken down or the copyright holder can take all the revenue from the video for themselves all of this is to say that I\n47:29\nwould really really appreciate it if you would consider becoming my Patron and supporting this content directly the\n47:35\nsoak is now my full-time job and it's very stressful to rely primarily on YouTube Revenu e as I currently do\n47:41\nbecause that's always liable to be cut from or taken away entirely copyright strikes can hit at any time literally\n47:4 8\nyears later and three strikes result in the termination of a YouTube ch annel if I don't contest the strike and win which\n47:54\nthankfully I've managed every time so far but my latest video for example had to go down f or 2 weeks while I fought a\n48:00\ncopyright battle with studio jibli and all that time it was taken down for mened got killed in the algorithm as you\n48:06\ncan see here not only does patreon help me feel more comfortab le making video essays but I'm also able to provide my\n48:12\npatrons wit h access to the videos even if and when they do get taken down and also gi ve Early Access before the rest\n48:18\nof the public if youve made it all the way here I'm going to go out in the limb and say you at least somewha t enjoy this video so I hope I might have earned some\n48:25\nof your supp ort and if you'd prefer to use a onetime donation and the link to my PayPa l is in the video description as\n48:30\nwell anyways that's it for the fi nancial plug I want to thank you so much for watching the video all the wa y through\n48:36\nand I hope you enjoyed it thank you to all my current pa trons and do let me know in the comments what you'd like to see me cover n ext and I hope I'll see\n48:42\nyou very soon for another video have a gre at day\n\n\n\n DTSTART;VALUE=DATE:20250425 RRULE:FREQ=YEARLY;INTERVAL=1 END:VEVENT END:VCALENDAR