Porco Rosso

Porco Rosso has slowly become one of my favourite Ghibli movies, and probably not for the reasons it should. While I like other Ghibli movies for the plot, or the capabilities of the characters, Porco Rosso is the kind of movie that shines for its interpersonal and intrapersonal relationships.

Imma analyse Porco’s and Gina’s characters from my perspective, their relationship and the reasons | like them, bc I can:

Porco Rosso: the protagonist of the story, it's so different from a lot of the male characters from Ghibli movies. While most of them respect women and value them and actually view them as capable and working, Porco (at the start) sees them as trophies, something to sleep with and just dip. And it shows in how he talks to Gina. Even if he is just her friend, the way he says like "do this" "do that" is very disrespectful. At the start and almost half through the movie, Porco is, effectively, sexist, something pretty common to the time the movie is settled in.

This is mostly shown in the first scenes with Fio, where he doesn't see her capable of designing the plane and just as a pretty face. And when she does the design, he actually sees some potential on it, but still doubts that she is going to be the one to build it.

So imagine his surprise when he finds out that not only will she build it, a whole team of women will build it. And as he sees them work, and Fio having more ideas for the plane he still scoffs and huffs but he decides to trust her to do it. When she decides to go with him, he gets upset, and tells her all the (sexist and objectifying) reasons she can't go with him. But she gives no room for discussion and they leave.

When they get to the cave and are surrounded by pirates, Porco shows his first signs of true improvement, complementing Fio's skill and not her physical appearance. When Fio puts herself on the line for the bet with Curtis, Porco actually tries to stop her, and after all that, when the pirates leave them, he thanks her for the help, and agrees that they are a team, and they should be together for each other.

After that, there is the (probably) most discussed scene in the movie, the one where Porco tells his backstory. This scene is probably the most depth we get from Marco, and it shows that he is a really sad man. Very tortured and guilt driven. We almost get the sense that the curse he has wasn't put on him by anyone else BUT himself. He clearly doesn't think he should be the one living, the one that survived that battle, the one that risks it all and still doesn't fail.

The one that Fio trusts. And it's all hidden beneath the face of a pig, that only shows his true face when he thinks about doing something for someone else with no benefit for him in return.

From there on, his development slows down again, and even if he shows that he has grown to respect Fio, Gina and possibly other women too, he still feels as if the world are is apart from him. Until Curtis punches him (literally and figuratively) with "Gina loves you" in which he starts processing everything too quick.

As the fight ends, he tells Gina to take Fio away, but now it's not because he is bossing her around, but because he cares for them both and doesn't want for them to be hurt by the military.

And this time he apologises to Gina, for again asking her to leave without him.

And even if that's the last we se of porco, I think it's a great closing. He isn't perfect and he still has a lot of things to think about and process. He is a flawed man, he has things to work on, and he has issues, but he is better than he was at the start of the movie. And he still has a road to go on, but he is no longer the solitary pig he was, he is just Marco now.

Gina: when we first meet the most beautiful woman in the movie (Fio is 17 don’t be weird) is through her singing a beautiful song (which from French is a translation of The Time of Cherries or smth) in which she talks about how the time two people spend together is far too short for both or something along the lines of. Her eyes light up when she sees Porco, but her duty is to entertain and to talk with the people in the bar around her. After all that, her and Marco share a moment together, and she laments that she cant free Marco from the curse. And even after the mood is even more dampened by the topic of her three deceased pilot husbands, they share that tiny moment together. 

As the movie progresses, Gina is treated pretty roughly, like she is just a decoration or someone to just talk to for a bit and dip, and she says it herself. We slowly learn more from her, that she is in love with Porco and that she really doesn’t want him to die, just like her late husbands. For her, Porco is the only one who is left from those times, and she doesn’t want to lose him and be alone again. 

By the end of the movie, Gina is going to warn Porco and Curtis about the militia, and when she gets there they had both been knocked out of combat. She knows that if she doesn’t get Porco to win, they will all lose and the militia will capture them, or Fio will be married to Curtis and never seen again, or just killed. As Porco wins she again expects something more from him, but all he gets is another errand to do and barely a sorry. She still does as requested, for she cares about Fio and Porco. 

In the end of the movie however, it is implied that she and Marco ended together, because of Fio’s phrasing and of the red plane on the side of her garden. It’s very pretty that she and Marco got together, because it implies that Marco actually changed and viewed her as something else than just a vase to move around and leave behind. She doesn’t get much character growth, for she already had her goals in mind at the start of the movie, but its a pretty story for a pretty girl.

Porco and Gina is an unfinished story, even at the end of the movie. It feels like they always felt something for each other, but because of circumstances they were never able to actually be together. The start of their relationship is them being friends since they were children, and bonding over the deaths of their other friends/partners. As the movie goes, Gina keeps worrying about Porco, and Porco keeps wanting to work and do whatever he wants, but its until Ferrari and Porco meet up that you start to see a change in him. Fio is probably the main determinant in the change of Porco, especially when she puts her singleness on the line so he can fight against Curtis.

She is the one that pushes him to open up and to try harder, and indirectly, to know that Gina loves him, as Curtis info dumps on him while they fight because he wants him to decide between one of the both. Porco understands that his love for Fio is almost platonic, and that Gina is really something a bit more than a friend. And Fio is the one that is brave enough to make Porco a human again, because Gina would never give that step. But after that, the implication that they eventually got together (aka. Gina won her bet) is clear at the end.

I really really like the relationship between both, and it makes me glad that a lot of people appreciate this movie. It really is one of my favourites. But share what you think if you want, I’d love to hear more about it.