The Tale of the Princess Kaguya

A bamboo cutter and his wife find a tiny girl inside a shining stalk of bamboo and raise her as their own. When she grows up, she is torn between her earthly upbringing and the celestial fate awaiting her.

From master animator Isao Takahata (Grave of the Fireflies, Only Yesterday) comes a dreamlike tale of a tiny girl plucked from a bamboo shoot and raised by a farmer and his wife. Kaguya hime grows rapidly, like the bamboo she came from, and is nicknamed Takenoko, or “Little Bamboo” by the village children. When her adopted parents suspect she might be part of a divine plan, they decide to raise her as a princess, moving her to the capital to teach her the royal ways and find her a suitor befitting her royal status. There, a slew of suitors, including the emperor himself, pursue her. Princess Kaguya knows in her heart that a greater, more mystical destiny awaits her, far beyond this earthly world.

Curator’s note

Based on a well-known 10th century Japanese literary tale, or monogatari, Isao Takahata worked for eight years to create this masterful Academy Award nominated adaptation, using impressionistic charcoal and watercolour animation left deliberately unfinished, leaving details up to the audience’s imagination.

From the free-spirited, earthy countryside of her youth, Kaguya hime finds herself within the oppressive walls of the palace as a young adult In dreamlike sequences deftly animated in beautiful charcoal, Kaguya hime struggles between the expectations of her adopted parents and suitors and a deep understanding of her mystical destiny. It's a story about holding on to what remains of ourselves when the world insists on making us into something else.