Lapda's City of the Sky

City in the Sky is an animated film by Miyazaki Hayao 1986, which is the pioneering work of Studio Ghibli. The background of the story is the imaginary European continent, and the legend of Laputa, the ideal world and sky city, is circulating in a gold mine. It is said that there are endless treasures and strange ability to control the world. Bass, a boy who lives in a mine, believes in this legend. Because my father filmed the city of the sky, one day Bath saved Sida, a girl who fell from the sky wearing a slungshot necklace, and then came to the army that chased Sida and the pirate's mother-in-law. It turns out that Sida is the child of Laputa, a city in the sky. Because only Hida can use magic to awaken the great energy possessed by the flying stone, the army wants to use her to gain wealth and power. Later, with the help of Bath and the pirate's mother-in-law, Hida finally returned to her hometown of Lapda Island, but there was only an ancient robot guarding the small life on Lapda Island, and Musca of the army finally found the core of the city of the sky-a black hemisphere below, a bigger flying stone that could control the world, and a stone tablet next to it. At this moment, Hida saved the world with magic, but Laputa Island was destroyed because of Musca's evil ambition, and finally the city of the sky was restored to its original appearance.

The word Laputa is also mentioned in Gulliver's Travels, which means floating island, that is, the city of the sky.

Flying stone is a substance extracted by ancient Laputa people with high technology, which can begin to float. Laputa people built Laputa city with this stone technology as the core.

Hiding in the crevice of the fireplace, Hida's ancestral flying stone depicts the golden Lapda royal coat of arms, which was required by the living elders to wear only for a short time when they got married.

The idea of flying stones came from Miyazaki Hayao's childhood reading about flying stones in "Desert Devil", a painting by Tieer in Fukushima.

Sky City is an animated film released by Studio Ghibli in 1986. The original work, producer, script and role setting of City in the Sky are all handled by Miyazaki Hayao, which makes this work full of Miyazaki Hayao's thoughts. [3] (The Castle in the Sky Laputa is generally regarded as a flying island in Gulliver's Travels, a famous novel by British writer jonathan swift. The manuscript of "City in the Sky" was written by Miyazaki Hayao after his adaptation of "Journey to Xiuna". The Journey to Xiuna is a fully painted book created by Miyazaki Hayao according to Tibetan folklore. However, due to the deterioration of Sino-Japanese relations at that time, it was not made into a film, which is also the reason why Miyazaki Hayao began to incorporate world peace into the theme of animation works. Because of its wonderful content, it is a milestone in the history of Miyazaki Hayao's creation. Therefore, some scenes and characters in the story have been re-adapted and added to the Shinto content processing, which has become the legend of the city of the sky, the ghost princess, the valley of the wind and the earthsea. Although Princess Ghost, Valley of the Wind and City of the Sky are more famous in China than this work, their popularity in Japan and Europe is far less than that in Xiuna's Travels. There are less than 1000 copies of this book, which belongs to endangered books and has high technology content, which cannot be reached by human beings. This overhead empire built on clouds was once a ruin, and the enviable flying technology can fly freely in the sky without running out of energy. This is the dream that human beings strive to realize in this life. In the animated film, Miyazaki Hayao leads us into Laputa, the city of the sky that originally existed in fantasy novels.

The inspiration and story structure of City in the Sky mainly comes from Gulliver's Travels by British writer Swift, in which Laputa is a floating island. The following is Gulliver's view of Lapda: "I walked along the edge of the rock for a while;" It's a beautiful day today. Wan Li is clear, and the blazing sun is shining with golden light. I have to turn my body to the other side so as not to burn my face. Just then, it suddenly got dark, and I felt something was wrong, because a cloud floated in the sky in peacetime, and the situation was different. I turned around and saw a huge opaque object floating in mid-air and flying towards my island. This object looks about two miles high. It blocks the sun for about six to seven minutes, but it doesn't make me feel that the air is getting cooler and the sky is not getting darker. It's like I'm standing in a valley facing the sun As it gets closer and closer to where I am, it looks like a solid, with a smooth bottom and shining in the reflection of the sea below. I stood about 200 yards above the sea and watched the huge object descend gradually, almost parallel to me, less than half a mile away. I just took out my pocket telescope and carefully looked at some people standing next to that thing, as if they were busy going up and down. The edge seems to be inclined, but I can't see what those people are doing. "

According to Gulliver's explanation, "Laputa is actually quasi lap outed (Latin), in which the correct meaning of lap is" sunshine dancing on the sea "and quasi is wings, but I don't want to impose my own meaning, so readers can judge for themselves." (Note 1)

This overhead empire, after the collapse of civilization, continued to float in the sky by relying on the ingenious flying stone technology on the island, and the girl wearing a flying stone necklace in the movie can be said to be the role of fate, because flying stone is the symbol of the royal family in the city of the sky, and owning flying stone is equivalent to having a pass to the sky. However, when the girl carrying the flying boat was shot down by pirates in the air, she was slowly lowered to the ground (located in the mine town) by the power of flying stones in a coma, but was rescued by the teenager Bass (Paz/Balu) who was engaged in mechanical engineering internship in the mine, the story began. When the girl didn't realize the danger she was in, she slowly landed on the ground with a pure image, surrounded by the soft light from the slungshot necklace, and finally fell into the arms of the boy. This first encounter sucked the audience's emotions in, as if fate had been predestined. The incredible experience made teenagers feel the idea of protecting girls anyway, and this picture remained in their hearts for a long time.

What young Bass wants to protect is not the secret of flying stones that pirates dream of, nor the mystery of the girl's blood source that was gradually solved later, but the first encounter, which made him feel that this girl is worth cherishing all his life. He cares about the girl herself, not the things around her.

Of course, the premise is that Miyazaki Hayao created a beautiful girl (laughs). Some people say that the girls painted by Miyazaki Hayao always look alike, but Hanazono Sakura in The Hidden Girl (Spirited Away) looks dull and stupid, which shows that the director has his own ideas. In the early full-length animation works, the heroine's shape is always set in the outline of western classical beauty, which implies some cruel tragic character. This trend can be seen in both the Valley of the Wind and the Ghost Princess. Although "City in the Sky" seems at first glance to be a dream story of a beautiful girl meeting a beautiful teenager, there is still endless sadness hidden behind the beautiful appearance. In fact, it reflects the real world, and cruel human nature is often the dominant behind desire.

This mode of thinking is the driving force to push the story forward, just like the flying stone that drives the audience's eyes to focus on the screen. The story leads the audience into the adventure world together, and everyone is moved by this animated film, because it ignites the long-cooled fuel in our hearts-"imagination".

Without imagination, how can the city of the sky float? Swift, the author of Gulliver's Travels, has a very good knowledge of mathematics, but his description of the floating island is vivid and never misses a detail, which conforms to the mechanistic aesthetics advocated by Britain when it entered the industrial society. From the realistic animation setting, we can find that Miyazaki Hayao paid attention to reality when dealing with the theme of fantasy world. If this reality is not stable enough, it will be impossible to highlight or set off the imagination scale of the whole overhead empire. Animated movies are no longer just childish cartoons in the eyes of ordinary people, but can also be accepted by adults. It is a movie, and it needs enough investment to appreciate the mystery. Miyazaki Hayao did it!

Protecting the people you love is the only way for teenagers to grow up. It is a long and arduous process to make him a real man through all kinds of tempering. When we saw that the two of them were about to collapse on the bridge truss of the valley railway, their hands were released, and Bass and Hida fell to the bottom together, close to the ground. With the wonderful power of slungshot, they let go of their hands and floated in the air, which was wonderful. At this time, they were just children, so innocent that they had no other thoughts, which was enviable. People on Lapda are very strange in appearance and clothes. Their heads are either tilted to the right or to the left. One of their eyes is concave inward, and the other is straight to the zenith. Their coats are decorated with patterns of the sun, moon and stars; Their vocal organs and auditory organs are very dull. They have to beat his mouth and ears with swollen urine and feces before they can speak and obey, otherwise they will forget what just happened.

People on the island are always on tenterhooks because they know a lot about astronomy. I am afraid that the sun will approach the earth day by day and the earth will be swallowed up by the sun. When you meet an acquaintance in the morning, first greet the health of the sun. Lapda Island is only about 10,000 mu, and the bottom layer is a diamond layer, which can be lifted and lowered at will with magnets. The king and his nobles live on the island, and there are some craftsmen, women and children. The king ruled a large area of territory and possessions outside the flying island. If his subjects disobey or rebel, he will fly over the scene of the accident by flying island; They are deprived of the right to enjoy the sunshine and rain, and they are directly hit on their heads with flying islands, crushing all houses, buildings and people and animals.

Scientists there sometimes do all kinds of funny research, such as: studying how to extract sunlight from cucumbers; Reduce feces to food; Farmland with pigs; Others want to weave webs with spiders and treat diseases with bellows. The goddess of the wind smiled and looked down at the earth. She blew a breeze gently, which dispelled the fog and the ignorance of Laputa people. So, on the endless grassland, Lapdaren set up the first crude windmill. Then windmills evolved, with towering towers as trunks and countless gears and levers as limbs. Then, Lapda's mining machine continued to dig deep underground. On the ground, the green grassland disappeared and was replaced by huge factories and chimneys that kept emitting smoke. At the same time, Laputa people did not stop marching into the sky. From a simple airship to a flying fleet equipped with advanced power sources; From an "aircraft carrier" that can be slowly lifted off by countless propellers to an air city that can be suspended in the clouds with only one large propeller at the bottom; Until Laputa, the sky city equipped with anti-gravity devices and flying stones. And these earth-shaking changes are only insignificant moments in the eyes of the goddess of the wind. Next, accompanied by dark clouds and lightning, a huge plane floated down from the city of the sky. From there, people came out in droves and threw themselves into the embrace of the earth. The goddess of the wind still pays attention to all this with a smile, and still caresses the earth with gentle wind. Laputa people returned to the natural way of life, which continued to Hida's generation. Simple windmills, lush grasslands, blue sky, white clouds, yaks, and lovely and innocent girl Hida holding a bucket. In a short and powerful form, Miyazaki Hayao described the theme song that is often ignored by the audience at the beginning, which is very profound.