Hayao Miyazaki's Takes on The Lord of the Rings Are Worse Than You Think

A week ago, an article titled ‘Hayao Miyazaki named the Hollywood films that he hates the most’ was published on a website called Far Out (which I did not know much about). The article explains Miyazaki's distaste for American media and culture, and the US in general, and in it he is quoted criticising The Lord of the Rings and Indiana Jones as ‘Hollywood films that he hates the most’, as the title says. After reading this article, as a Japanese person, I feel compelled to write an article examining Miyazaki's opinions, and explain why I think he is not only wrong on many points about the films he mentions, but also that what he says in the interview is problematic and potentially harmful.

I would like to mention upfront that I am what someone would call a Tolkien fanboy, considering my being a huge fan of The Lord of the Rings film series and owning almost all of Tolkien's writings in deluxe edition format, and so on. However, I am not writing this article criticising Miyazaki just because he showed his dislike towards The Lord of the Rings; it seems to me the problem goes much deeper than an individual simply not liking a certain fantasy film trilogy.

Why I do not agree with Miyazaki's take on LotR

There is a multitude of problems with his statements in the interview that have to be addressed, and I advise you to first go read the original article by Swapnil Dhruv Bose, linked above. The following quote illustrates several of the issues that I would like to discuss in this article.

“Americans shoot things and they blow up and the like, so as you’d expect, they make movies like that,” Miyazaki stated. “If someone is the enemy, it’s okay to kill endless numbers of them. Lord of the Rings is like that. If it’s the enemy, there’s killing without separation between civilians and soldiers. That falls within collateral damage.”

from ‘Hayao Miyazaki named the Hollywood films that he hates the most’ by Swapnil Dhruv Bose

I shall address what is arguably the most obvious issue with this quote first: The Lord of the Rings, neither the books nor the films, are rooted within what one would label 'American culture'. This should be fairly obvious considering that the novel was written by J.R.R. Tolkien, a British author born in South Africa, and that the film adaptation was created by a New Zealand director in New Zealand. Even though the films were distributed by New Line Cinema, an American film production studio, it can hardly be said that the films are imbued with American values or political ideologies to an appreciable degree.

To better explain the next problem with his views, I quote again:

“… The Lord of the Rings is a movie that has no problem doing that [not separating civilians from enemies, apparently]. If you read the original work, you’ll understand, but in reality, the ones who were being killed are Asians and Africans. Those who don’t know that, yet say they love fantasy are idiots.”

from ‘Hayao Miyazaki named the Hollywood films that he hates the most’ by Swapnil Dhruv Bose

I would go so far as to argue that his criticism for LotR present in the above quotes is missing the mark entirely. I namely object to his statement that the characters in LotR have no problem ’killing without separation between civilians and soldiers’ — I assume that by this Miyazaki is referring to how the heroes of the movies kill enemy soldiers seemingly without any remorse. The issue is, however, to the best of my knowledge, civilian Orcs, or any other evil being that is not somehow involved in the ongoing war, are never present in LotR films, and it is questionable whether civilian Orcs ever existed in Tolkien's Legendarium in the first place. Tolkien's Orcs are not a race comparable to other races such as Elves and Men in that they were not created by Eru-Illúvatar, the supreme being that is responsible for the conception of Arda, but are a later invention by Morgoth, the main antagonist of the Legendarium (at least the early parts of it). After reading Tolkien's works, including The Silmarillion, Unfinished Tales, The History of Middle-Earth etc., besides The Lord of the Rings, I do not remember ever reading about Orcs forming a meaningful society where the roles are divided between soldiers and civilians.

Whether or not civilian Orcs existed, LotR is still far from a glorification of violence; it is a story of ordinary people overcoming an impossible challenge, a celebration of peace, friendship, and courage. Taking in to account Tolkien's background (his participation in WWI and loss of his friends in the war), it is all the more apparent that his story has an anti-war message, and I am perplexed as to how Miyazaki got the impression that the characters are engaging in ’killing without separation between civilians and soldiers’. This entire quote from Miyazaki begs the question of whether he really saw the whole trilogy and understood the story and its implications. I do not expect him to understand every piece of lore that has to do with orcs that is not explained in the films, but I would say he should have tried to get a better understanding of the material in question.

Miyazaki's anti-American stance

The issues go deeper, however, as I have said in the beginning. If Miyazaki had simply expressed his dislike towards LotR and Indiana Jones, I would not have had that much of a problem with it. Maybe I would not have written this article. Miyazaki has every right to like or dislike a work of art, just as anyone does, whether or not I believe he is misguided in doing so.

However, what is much more problematic is that he also has quite a xenophobic and chauvinistic attitude towards the US and American culture in general, while also condemning fellow Japanese people who enjoy aforementioned films (or probably any American pieces of media). This should be already somewhat obvious from the first two quotes above, but I shall add another, to reinforce my points.

“Even in the Indiana Jones movies, there is a white guy who, ‘bang,’ shoots people, right? Japanese people who go along and enjoy with that are unbelievably embarrassing,” he explained. “You are the ones that, ‘bang,’ get shot. Watching [those movies] without any self-awareness is unbelievable. There’s no pride, no historical perspective. You don’t know how you are viewed by a country like America.”

from ‘Hayao Miyazaki named the Hollywood films that he hates the most’ by Swapnil Dhruv Bose, emphasis mine

At this point, I do not have to further point out the hatred Miyazaki harbours against America. If this was, for example, an American director talking about another country, framing people of a certain nationality as simple-minded (’Americans shoot things and they blow up and the like’) and violent (‘killing without separation between civilians and soldiers’), it would not have been a surprise if they had been cancelled into oblivion. I am not saying that he should be cancelled as well, since I do not always completely agree with the so-called ‘cancel culture’; I just do not understand how such an influential figure gets away with expressing hate towards an entire nation/nationality so openly.

What is equally upsetting is that Miyazaki calls fans of The Lord of the Rings and Indiana Jones ‘unbelievably embarrassing‘ ‘idiots’. He bases this opinion on the assumption that those who are killed by the heroes of The Lord of the Rings are analogous to ‘Asians and Africans’. While it is not uncommon for Tolkien's works to be criticised for having racist undertones (this is a discussion that warrants an entire article or video on its own), directly equating the forces of evil to Asian and African races is absurd. It seems to me that this is precisely the sort of analogy Tolkien famously criticised (which is admittedly often misunderstood — I recommend you check out this video on the exact quote by YouTuber Daniel Greene). This is nothing short of an egregious misrepresentation of the work's nature, and his act of slandering those who like LotR based on such a subjective, twisted interpretation is apalling.

It also puzzles me why he would generalise his denouncement to ’[t]hose who don’t know that, yet say they love fantasy‘, considering many of his own films can be considered as works belonging to the fantasy genre. If Miyazaki actually thinks that ‘fantasy’ is a genre that solely caters to what he sees as the typical American mindset (which, he believes, takes no issues with indiscriminate killing of Asians and Africans), that would be quite disrespectful towards fantasy authors, film directors, and game developers who are genuinely trying to produce works of art that allow us to experience things heretofore unseen, broaden our minds, and in the end, possibly, help make the world better.

My final thoughts (as a Japanese, a creator, and a LotR fan) on Miyazaki

I was curious about what other Japanese people think about Miyazaki's opinions as explained above, but I was unable to confirm whether the same news was reported in Japan. From my experience, though, Japanese people in general regard him highly in spite of what I personally see as questionable behaviour as explained above. I don't blame them, for what he achieved creatively deserves praise, even though I personally have never been a big fan of Miyazaki (this I know is a hot take; I might talk about this some other time). Unlike Miyazaki himself, I take no issues with people liking him and his works, but I do think it is important to address the anti-American attitude that he openly displays, and logically and rationally criticise it. I genuinely hope that American people, or people from any country, for that matter, do not come to the conclusion that all Japanese people have a similar sentiment towards foreign countries.

It is my belief that creators, in one way or another, should spread a positive influence to others, and I do not think Miyazaki's disdainful remarks towards America did that (if anything, they gave me — and probably other people — negative feelings). As a fantasy/sci-fi creator myself, I would like to hammer home the point that fantasy can have positive real-life consequences through influencing and changing people's mind for the better. Reading this article on Miyazaki strengthened my resolve and sense of responsibility to spread love, not hate, and to unite, not divide, through my creative activities.

Lastly, thank you for giving this article a read, and I hope you can forgive the grammatical mistakes and clumsy expressions in the text — I have been studying English as my second language for more than 10 years, but I still struggle with writing prose that sounds natural.