What was the last movie you saw?

I recently purchased Studio Ghibli's The Boy and the Heron off of Amazon during their recent discount day.  The movie was fantastic, and I highly recommend it to anyone who reads this.  As usual, Hayao Miyazaki did an amazing job with Studio Ghibli's talent to create a wonderful story.  Miyazaki returns to World War 2 in a way that echoes The Grave of Fireflies, yet it takes a different path in its story telling.  Isao Takahata just made the world cry with that film, and even though it was a wonderfully made movie, the depressing nature of the film does not make me want to watch it again and again. 

Miyazaki follows the story of Mahito Maki, whose mother dies in a hospital fire in Tokyo in the beginning of the movie.  His father runs a factory for the war, and they move to a more rural area where a new factory exists.  His father remarries to his mother's younger sister, and she is now pregnant.  Mahito is disliked at his new school, and he gets the tar beaten out of him by the school kids on the first day.  While recovering at home, he decides to explore the estate they are currently living on, and it just so happens that a blue heron follows him around.  Eventually, it speaks, and it says he is invited somewhere.  Mahito explores an old tower that has been sealed away that is on the property, but he can't get far.  His step mother feels like she has failed as a step mother already, since Mahito has not been happy since the move.  She disappears in a forest, and Mahito joins the search party.  The forest and the tower are mysteriously connected, and Mahito is about to embark on a story in which he will delve into the past, a mysterious world, and the inner reaches of his psyche.  

To avoid spoilers, I'll stop there.  The story is wonderful and endearing.  It isn't light natured like Totoro or The Cat Returns, but it isn't as dark as Grave of Fireflies.  I would compare it more or less to Spirited Away, but it is a bit darker than that.  As usual, the music and the artwork are perfect.  In a world that seems hell bent on digitizing animation and adding crappy AI everywhere you look, it is great to see a hand drawn movie by Studio Ghibli.  I respect them so much for that.  Each scene is a wonder to behold, like so many of their other films.  I watched the English dub, it it was done superbly.  A lot of big names are in this one, and I'm willing to bet they just wanted to be a part of a Miyazaki film, since there can't be many left.  Robert Pattinson, Karen Fukuhara, Christian Bale, Mark Hamill, Willem Dafoe, and Dave Bautista did a fantastic job.  Luca Padovan voiced Mahito.  I don't know much about him, but I have seen that he has done work in the "Are You Afraid of the Dark?" series, and I loved the original run in the 90s.  He did a great job here.

If you can't tell, I recommend this movie.  There is a reason it won an Academy Award.  Those awards don't mean much anymore, but I feel like the academy remembered their purpose and did something right with this one.