Interestingly enough, Howl can see Sophie’s true beauty even through the mask of an old woman and Sophie accepts and loves Howl regardless of his hair color and mysterious behavior.

He is horrified when “grandma” Sophie cleans his bathroom and the potions end up turning his hair from a golden color to a deep black. Howl uses magic and potions to keep his appearance in the exact way he approves of. While Sophie’s character basically accepts the fact that she thinks she is not beautiful, Howl does not. Howl and Sophie are related in that they both are unhappy with the way they look. These are the times where she is portrayed as a younger, beautiful woman or even girl. It is times when Sophie feels love, courage, pride, and true happiness that she lets her guard down and becomes her true self. This is reflected with her change into the very old woman directly after the Witch of Waste casts her curse.

Sophie does not see herself as beautiful or important when the film begins. The fluctuations in her outward appearance come from fluctuations in her self esteem and attitude.

These different appearances can be seen in the stills below.īut what do these different transformations mean in association to the film’s story? On the basic level the ways in which we see Sophie is a representation of how she sees herself throughout the film. Some may say that Sophie appears looking younger than how she did when the film begins. After this curse has been set Sophie can be seen in a number of ways: a young girl with brown hair, an older woman perhaps 20 to 30 years younger than what is seen in the first transformation with far fewer wrinkles and much better posture, a young woman much like she first appeared but with gray or silver hair, as well as with short hair when her long locks are cut off by Calcifer. Quickly into the film Sophie is cursed by the Witch of the Waste and we then see her portrayed as a very old woman with heavy wrinkles and a hunch in her back. She begins the film as a young woman with long brown hair. The character that undergoes the most number of changes over the course of the film is Sophie. Not only are these changes visually interesting and play up to the unique narrative of the film, but they also help in character development and let us better understand the true qualities of the character as it is reflected in their personal appearance. In the beloved Japanese animated film Howl’s Moving Castle by Hayoa Miyazaki nearly every character, certainly every main character, can be seen going through some sort of physical metamorphosis.

Howls moving castle movie