Name: The Boy and the Heron
Genre: Animation, Fantasy, Drama
Released: 2023-07-14
Duration: 2 h 4 min
Rating: 8.3
Cast: Soma Santoki, Masaki Suda, Ko Shibasaki, Aimyon, Yoshino Kimura

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Synopsis

Where death comes to an end, life finds a new beginning.

While the Second World War rages, the teenage Mahito, haunted by his mother's tragic death, is relocated from Tokyo to the serene rural home of his new stepmother Natsuko, a woman who bears a striking resemblance to the boy's mother. As he tries to adjust, this strange new world grows even stranger following the appearance of a persistent gray heron, who perplexes and bedevils Mahito, dubbing him the "long-awaited one."

Reviews from Movi members

barackobama8.2July 27, 2026

Wow what a blessing that I can watch another Miyazaki movie for the first time. In a lot of ways it felt like I had watched it before. Like Spirited Away, the movie ignores things that don’t matter. There are little explanations bc theres no need to. Lots of themes/ideas seemed deeply personal and I don’t really understand them. I’m all for artists having inside jokes/meanings with themselves so that’s ok. But I’m guessing that some of the meanings align with my own personal reflections over the past few years.