I find this film both funny and heart warming.

The animation was beautiful, the voice acting was adiquite but I feel I need to buy the DVD to get the Japanese language version as I feel it might be superior.

All right, I have to redeem myself for bad mouthing Nausicaa, with this subtle masterpiece, Porco Rosso. This has to be Miyazaki's deepest, most personal film. However, you have to be willing to think about it for a long time, or watch the film two or three times. I did both, because I sensed an underlying importance I was uncertain i grasped. When the backbone was finally recognized, it's quite simple, but incredible to realize it was surfaced in this film.
The story is about a bounty hunter who goes by the name of Porco. The story seems neat and simple, as he meets many colorful characters such as Sea Pirates, his old attraction, Gina, an innocent girl named Fio who gives him more faith in humanity, and a rival pompous, but good-hearted American pilot named Curtis. The challenges of bounty catching and other conflicts meet throughout the film, but what becomes most alarming, is how deep and personal the scenes truly are. When I first saw the film, I felt empathy, but with thought. I later realized Porco's true story.
He turned himself into a pig through his uncertainty, and hatred for humanity and himself. This is caused by his decision to side with his country, rather than his love, Gina (because she lives in enemy territory). Furthermore, THIS is caused by his experience in air wars, watching his best friend (Gina's husband) get shot down. He contemplates, regrets, and eventually forgoes the different decisions he could have made, including abandoning Gina. Through all this motion in his mind, he begins to hate himself, willingly throwing away his human self, and curses himself into becoming a pig in response to how he feels with the battles of The Great Depression, and his own choices.
By the end of the film, the only question we have, (aside from the many Italian words throughout the film) is whether or not Porco turned back into a human. Curtis comments that he wants to see Porco's face, because he noticed a 'change'. I believe I know the answer after watching the last scenes of the film, but it all remains rather mystified.

This film really impressed me. Perhaps because it's the only Miyazaki film I've seen which is squarely aimed at adults - but there has to be more to it than that.

Porco Rosso differs from all the earlier Miyazaki-written Ghibli films in that it doesn't have a fantasy setting - it's very specifically set around 1929-30, in Italy and in the islands between Italy and Yugoslavia. Miyazaki's love of aviation and Italy shows through in his usual loving attention to detail - not just the design of the planes, but in historical detail: hyperinflation and the rise of fascism. There are other fantastic little touches, too. My favourite is where the women are rebuidling the plane and you see a shot of Porco sitting smoking a cigarette and rocking a baby's cradle while he waits. I don't know who else would have thought of something like that.

Porco used to be a human, but has turned into a pig, because of a 'spell'. Who put this spell on him? It's one of numerous things we never find out, though we can make some pretty safe assumptions about. Whatever the case, the flashback scene where Porco explains what triggered the transformation is one of the most sublimely beautiful and touching sequences I've ever seen in an animated movie.

In looks, it's nothing at all like his earlier epics, though rather like 'Kiki' in its bright, sparkling, mediterranean backdrops. It has comedy. Unsurprisngly, it has lots of flying action sequences. There is a love story, a beautiful between-the-wars vision of a paradise about to be snatched away, and a mysterious theme about a man who has turned into a pig ("I'm not a person", he tells a bank teller who asks him for a donation 'for the people' (i.e. the Fascist Party)

To me this is a really unique movie. If it reminds me of anything, it's 'Casablanca'. Kids and teenagers may not like it. Personally I think it's better than 'Nausicaa', 'Castle in the Sky' or 'Kiki's Delivery Service' (though the latter comes fairly close.) I like the narrower focus. His epics were just a little impersonal for my tastes.

This film very nearly scored four stars from me.

And yes... having seen 'Tailspin' now, I have to agree wtih Inkwolf. The similarities are too obvious to be coincidence - though I suppose it's concievable that being a feature film, Porco Rosso was actually concieved first (it came out between 1 and 2 years later). On the surface though you have to suspect Miyazaki of lifting some ideas here. It's only Disney's track record of this that's making me wonder was really thought up first.

(NB: this review refers to the subtitled version. I have no idea what the English voice cast is like.)

Porco Rosso is a fun movie, with broad humor and broad characters. There is a subtle, understated romance running in the background, and the situation of Marco's transformation into a pig is a metaphor for his self-contempt ever since the day he was the only survivor of the air battle which took all his friends' lives.

But don't expect emotional and intellectual depth beyond that--this is a fable, a tale of larger-than-life characters, bold seaplane pilots who perfom incredible feats of acrobatics and slug it out over their honor and women, fighting with planes, bullets, fists, and whatever else comes to hand.

Porco Rosso is based in the 1930's, in the Adriatic sea, in a world of sea planes, air pirates and hiding out from Fascists. Fans of the two-years-earlier Disney Afternoon television series, Talespin, will note a LOT of striking similarities...to the point where I'd call Porco Rosso a rip-off of Talespin. Apparently Miyazaki and Disney Studios were both doing a lot of borrowing from each other at that time!