AnimationWorld Magazine — January 16, 2018
A Practical Guide to Magic: Studio Ponoc’s ‘Mary and The Witch’s Flower’
Mary and The Witch’s Flower, the debut feature from Studio Ponoc, arrives in U.S. theaters this Friday courtesy of indie animation distributor GKIDS, preceded by a one-night nationwide premiere event from Fathom Events.
The 2D anime feature is directed by Academy Award-nominee Hiromasa Yonebayashi (The Secret World of Arrietty, When Marnie Was There) and produced by Studio Ponoc founder and two-time Academy Award-nominee Yoshiaki Nishimura (The Tale of The Princess Kaguya, When Marnie Was There). Launched in 2015 with a team of veteran Studio Ghibli animators, Studio Ponoc taps into the visual style and storytelling sensibility for which the legendary studio is known, hoping to pick up the mantle of creating world-class animation for all ages.
Based on Mary Stewart’s 1971 children’s book, “The Little Broomstick,” and featuring a script by Riko Sakaguchi, Mary and The Witch’s Flower centers on an ordinary young girl named Mary, who discovers a flower that grants magical powers, but only for one night. As she is whisked into an exciting new world beyond belief, she must learn to stay true to herself:
Mary is a plain, young girl, stuck in a rural British village with her Great-Aunt Charlotte and seemingly no adventures or friends in sight. But a chance encounter with a pair of mysterious cats leads Mary into the nearby forest, where she finds an old broom stuck in the overgrowth of a nearby tree, and the strange blue glow of the fly-by-night flower, a rare plant that blossoms only once every seven years. As the broom comes to life and lifts Mary high into the skies, she discovers a mysterious school for witches above the clouds. But the charming headmistress Madam Mumblechook and bumbling Doctor Dee are not all that they appear, in a twisting tale that reveals even the most ordinary-seeming children are capable of the most extraordinary adventures.
The English-language version of the film, directed by Yonebayashi and produced by Geoffrey Wexler, features the voices of Ruby Barnhill, Kate Winslet and Jim Broadbent. The English dub was recorded in London in September 2017, and had its premiere in Los Angeles at the inaugural ANIMATION IS FILM Festival in October.