Tales From Earthsea Returns to Theaters for Ghibli Fest
Ghibli Fest 2026 continues on August 8 with a 20th anniversary theatrical run of Tales From Earthsea, the studio’s adaptation of Ursula K. Le Guin’s beloved fantasy novels.
The most debated Ghibli film
Earthsea has always been the complicated child of the Ghibli catalog. It was the directorial debut of Goro Miyazaki, son of Hayao, and its darker, moodier fantasy divided critics on release. Two decades later, the film reads differently. Freed from the impossible expectations of its family name, it stands as a handsome, melancholy fantasy with some of the studio’s most striking landscapes.
Anniversary screenings are exactly the right way to revisit it. Big screen scale flatters the film’s painterly vistas, and audiences who only know the headline Ghibli classics owe themselves a look at the strange corners of the catalog too.
Source: Fandango
My take: Earthsea is better than its reputation and always was. Judged as its own film instead of a Hayao Miyazaki movie that does not exist, it is a solid fantasy with real atmosphere.
