Ponyo is story of a 5 year old boy named Sosuke who finds a magical fish that has left the confines of its father's submarine. Hayao Miyazaki routinely brings brilliance to the screen so I had high expectations for the latest film to hit US theaters. Unfortunately, Ponyo was lacking the magic of Howl's Moving Castle and Spirited Away. Well, the movie had plenty of actual magic but I wasn't sucked into the artificial world as I was in the other films. The story lacked exposition which could have served to make more sense of the story and its characters. Also, the characters of his films usually reside in an obvious fantasy world. In this film, the story tried to keep one foot in the real world and it was hard to take it seriously without laughing at the absurdity of Sosuke's mother's actions. (8/24/2009)