Earwig and the Witch (PG), on NHK G
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This originally aired on Japanese television in 2020, before being released in theaters the next year. I first saw it in 2024, as part of my summer of Ghibli. The movie is based on a book I haven't read. It got mostly negative reviews, but I liked it, though not as much as most Ghibli films. It's the studio's first CGI movie, so it looks rather different from other Ghibli films, but I actually liked the animation more than I expected to (though it's certainly not up to par with, say, Pixar). In particular, I thought the title character, Earwig, was a really cute kid. I should say it's misleading that the DVD case (and before that a promotional poster) shows her singing with a band, which never happens in the movie.

It begins with a red-haired woman on a motorcycle fleeing from a yellow car that is pursuing her. She manages to lose them and goes to an orphanage, where she drops off her baby with a note saying the infant's name is Earwig (Aya, in the Japanese version of the film). But the orphanage's matron changes the baby's name to Erica Wigg. The note also says her mother is a witch on the run from other witches, which the matron doesn't believe, but her assistant does.

The film then flashes forward about 10 years, and we see that Erica greatly enjoys living in the orphanage, and has no desire to be adopted. Her best friend is a boy named Custard, who does whatever Earwig wants, even when he's scared of what she wants to do. In fact, everyone in the orphanage does whatever Earwig wants them to do, apparently because she acts sweetly toward them, particularly the adults who work there. Then one day a strange couple, Bella Yaga and the Mandrake, come to adopt a child, and they choose Earwig, much to her chagrin. When Earwig finds out Bella is a witch, she hopes she'll teach her magic, but Bella has no intentions of doing that. She just wants to use Earwig as a laborer. Earwig would like to run away, but the place is enchanted, making escape impossible. So, she becomes determined to make Bella and the Mandrake (who is apparently some sort of demon) do what she wants, just like she did with everyone at the orphanage. She also befriends Bella's familiar, a talking cat named Thomas (who somehow reminds Earwig of Custard). Eventually, she learns that Bella and the Mandrake had once been in a band called Earwig, along with a red-haired woman. (Of course she has no idea the woman is her mother, nor that she herself was named after the band, since she still thinks her name is Erica.)

I don't really want to spoil much more of the plot, but I will say that toward the end of the movie, Earwig's situation in the house changes quite a bit, and rather suddenly, I thought. And then on Christmas, the red-haired woman shows up at the door (at the same time as Custard was coming for a visit). And the movie just ends there, abruptly. I thought it was a strange scene to end on, and wondered if my DVD had just skipped to the end credits because of a glitch. But it hadn't. That really was the end. I would have expected at least one scene of Earwig learning about the woman, and her own origins, and everything. And it would have been interesting to see her mother reunite with her old bandmates (particularly as there's a hint at one point in the movie that she and the Mandrake had been dating, which suggests he might be Earwig's father). There's just so much that goes unresolved. I suppose it's not the weirdest possible spot to end the movie, but I still thought it was a pretty weird choice. I kind of wonder if the original novel ended differently, but I suppose I'll never find out.

But aside from the way it ended, I basically found it to be an enjoyable movie, and not entirely un-Ghibli-like. Some people apparently consider Earwig a brat, but I liked her. I feel bad that the movie was received so negatively by critics, but I can understand their being underwhelmed when trying to hold it up to Ghibli's usual standards.