A life-size replica of Studio Ghibli’s Howl’s Moving Castle dog Heen is up for adoption! The official online store for Studio Ghibli Donguri Sora will be accepting reservations from May 28, 2022.
The 28-centimeter tall Heen replica is made of polyester resin and weighs ca. eight kilograms.
The deadline will be closed once the planned number of reservations has been reached. A general sale will be scheduled after the reserved amount has been shipped, provided the item hasn’t been sold out. The product is scheduled to be delivered in mid-August 2022.
The Heen replica is one of only a few of Studio Ghibli’s life-size statues — a real 1:1 full-scale recreation.
About Studio Ghibli’s Howl’s Moving Castle anime adaptation
Howl’s Moving Castle (ハウルの動く城, Hauru no Ugoku Shiro) is a 2004 animated film by Studio Ghibli that was written and directed by Hayao Miyazaki. The movie is loosely (quite loosely!) based on the 1986 Diana Wynne Jones’ namesake novel.
The plot follows a young woman Sophie who is turned into an elderly woman by the Witch of the Waste. Not knowing what exactly to do, Sophie sets out and comes upon the titular Howl’s moving castle, a household of sorts of the wizard Howl.
Howl’s Moving Castle has a strong pacifist note and it differs greatly from the original novel, which focuses on unrelated aspects of the story (and character routes are also different). While it depicts a romance unfolding between Sophie and Howl, it also deals with far more profound topics, such as old age and the helplessness of common people during war times.
Howl’s Moving Castle premiered at the 61st Venice International Film Festival (September 2004) and was theatrically released in Japan one month later (on November 20, 2004). Soon thereafter, it won four Tokyo Anime Awards and a Nebula Award for Best Script.
Howl’s Moving Castle has received critical acclaim and has proved to be one of the most commercially successful Japanese films of all time.
Heen (ヒン) doesn’t play a leading role in the movie but is one of the most beloved Howl’s Moving Castle characters all the same.
Diana Wynne Jones’ Howl’s Moving Castle novel
Howl’s Moving Castle by Diana Wynne Jones was first published in 1986. Twenty years later, it won The Children’s Literature Association Phoenix Award due to the popularity of Studio Ghibli’s Howl’s Moving Castle film (which was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Animated Feature at the time).
The novel is the first installment of the Howl Series, which also includes Castle in the Air (1990) and House of Many Ways (2008).
In 2004, before the movie was to be released, Hayao Miyazaki had traveled to England to give Jones a private viewing. The book author reportedly said that although the film is different from the book, it is fantastic nevertheless.
