Film

Porco Rosso

Name: Porco Rosso
Genre: Animation, Adventure, Fantasy
Released: 1992
Cast: Shūichirō Moriyama, Tokiko Kato, Bunshi Katsura VI, Tsunehiko Kamijô, Akemi Okamura

Miyazaki's mid-career oddity: a WWII-era ex-fighter pilot turned pig, flying solo dogfights over the Adriatic against sky pirates and fascist bureaucracy. It's gorgeous, funny, and quietly melancholic — a hangout movie about guilt, aging and refusing to fight for a cause you don't believe in. Perfect for anyone who wants Ghibli's warmth without a kid-movie plot, plus thrilling seaplane combat.

TMDb rating

7.8

If you liked this

Castle in the Sky1986

Miyazaki's first Ghibli feature has the same lust for flying machines and derring-do, but turns it into a full-blown pirate-adventure fairy tale with a genuinely thrilling airship chase.

But It's aimed squarely at kids in a way Porco Rosso isn't, and the romance is far more innocent.

The Wind Rises2013

Miyazaki's final (for a while) film returns to interwar aviation, this time as a sincere, aching biography of the man who designed Japan's Zero fighter — beauty and complicity tangled together.

But No pig, no jokes, no pirates — it's slow, wistful, and asks hard questions about art made for war.

Warriors of the Wind1984

Miyazaki's breakthrough gives you the same gliding-through-open-sky feeling and a heroine who'd get along fine with Fio, wrapped in post-apocalyptic ecological myth instead of interwar politics.

But It's earnest to the point of preachy at times, and the environmental message is laid on thick.

The wildcard

Something you would not have found on your own.

Wings of Defeat2007no page yet

Porco Rosso's guilt over surviving a war he still won't talk about is played for real here: elderly former kamikaze pilots reckon, on camera, with why they lived and their friends didn't.

A quietly devastating documentary that interviews the last surviving Japanese kamikaze pilots about what it actually felt like to volunteer to die — and, in some cases, not.

But This is history, not fantasy — sober, sad, and unhurried. If you wanted more seaplane dogfights, this offers none.

Kiki's Delivery Service1989

Same director, same coastal-town warmth and obsessive love of flight, but pitched gentler — a coming-of-age charmer about independence and growing up, not guilt and war.

But If you wanted more of Porco's world-weariness and moral shadow, this is almost too sweet by comparison.

Spirited Away2001

The Ghibli everyone's already seen, and for good reason — same painterly imagination, same knack for making the fantastical feel lived-in, true, and a little dangerous.

But It's a very different animal tonally — younger heroine, spirit-world fantasy, none of Porco's adult cynicism.

Howl's Moving Castle2004

Another Miyazaki hero cursed into an unusual shape, another war looming offstage, another story about refusing to fight — with some of the most beautiful flying sequences he's ever drawn.

But The plot wanders more than Porco Rosso's tight little adventure, and the romance takes over the back half.

Raiders of the Lost Ark1981

For the same pulpy 1930s adventure itch: a wisecracking loner outrunning fascists, punching actual Nazis, and getting the girl, with the same interwar globe-trotting swagger and pluck.

But It's a straight-faced action blockbuster with none of Porco's melancholy or animation's freedom of movement.

The Rocketeer1991

A gee-whiz 1930s pulp throwback about a stunt pilot who becomes an accidental hero — same golden-age aviation glamour, same fascist villains, way more Hollywood swagger.

But It's slighter and sunnier than Porco Rosso overall, with none of its war-guilt undertow or moral weight.

The Sky Crawlers2008no page yet

Mamoru Oshii's anime imagines eternally young pilots fighting endless wars for entertainment — a colder, more philosophical cousin to Porco's meditation on why men keep flying into danger.

But It's deliberately slow and chilly where Porco Rosso is warm; patience required, and the reward is more cerebral than fun.

Wings1927

Decades before Miyazaki drew his first biplane, this silent Best Picture winner shot real WWI dogfights with real planes and gave cinema its first great romance between men and flying machines.

One of the earliest films to fall in love with aerial combat the way Porco Rosso does — the stunt flying is real, dangerous, and still astonishing nearly a century later.

But It's a silent film with all that implies: title cards, big gestures, and a pace built for 1927 audiences, not yours.

Flyboys2006no page yet

Same mercenary-pilots-for-hire setup and interwar dogfighting spectacle as Porco Rosso, but played completely straight as a glossy, unabashedly cheesy war-romance blockbuster with zero irony.

If you just want more men in leather jackets flying rickety planes at each other for money and honour, this delivers it with big CGI dogfights and a straight face.

But It has none of Miyazaki's wit or melancholy — this is comfort-food war spectacle, corny dialogue and all.