The next stoner classic from justifiably renowned animator Hayao Miyazaki, Ponyo On the Cliff by the Sea, opened yesterday at the Venice Film Festival. Warning: spoilers abound in the article.

Ponyo appears to be less popular in Japan than the Oscar-winning Spirited Away (although there’s strangely no mention of the more recent Howl’s Moving Castle…) — but considering Spirited Away is one of the best films of the last 10 years, I think that’s ok.

“I think animation at times needs the pencil and needs man’s drawing hand,” Miyazaki said.

Miyazaki’s animation depicts layers of sea life churning one over the other. Waves transform into fish and back again, schools of fish surge as if a wave. Details keep it real and modern: a passing frigate in the background, a knocked-over flowerpot in a storm, a broken piece of ramen noodle on the coffee table.

Miyazaki acknowledged inspiration from the Hans Christian Andersen story, but said the similarity was only glancing. He said he was always bothered even as a child that Andersen’s mermaids were deprived of souls.

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