Kurenai no Buta (Porco Rosso)

Q: Why is the English title "Porco Rosso", not "Crimson Pig"?

"Porco Rosso" means "Crimson Pig" in Italian. This is the official title Ghibli gave to it.

Q: Is it based on a manga or a book?

It's based on a manga, "Zassou Note, Hikoutei Jidai" ("Miscellaneous Memoranda—The age of Seaplanes", 1992, Dainippon Kaiga, ISBN4-499-20595-6), which Miyazaki serialized in "Model Graphix". To know more about this manga, see the Porco Manga page.

Q: When did the story take place?

At the end of the 1920s. It sounded like the middle of the Great Depression, which started in 1929 (in the manga, it was stated that the story took place in the summer of 1929).

Q: Where did it take place?

Most of the story, except when Porco went to Milan, took place in the Adriatic, between Italy and the former Yugoslavia. Porco lived on an island on the Croatian shoreline of the Adriatic sea.

At first, Miyazaki planned to set the story in Dovrok City, Croatia. However, Miyazaki was shocked by the civil war in the former Yugoslavia, which started while he was making "Porco". As a result, the story became a bit more serious than he intended (at first it was supposed to be "a fun movie for middle-aged businessmen whose brains became tofu from overwork"), and he moved the story out of Croatia.

Q: In which languages were the opening lines written?

From the top: Japanese, Italian, Korean, English, Chinese, Spanish, Arabic, Russian, French, and German.

"Porco Rosso" was first planned as a 30-45 minutes in-flight movie on Japan Airlines ("a movie which tired businessmen on international flights can enjoy even with their minds dulled due to lack of oxygen"). As Miyazaki's imagination took off, it became a feature-length movie. To show it on JAL's international flights, they had to provide an introduction in many languages (supposedly).

Q: Why did Porco become a pig?

Although it was never mentioned in the movie, a press release states that he was disillusioned with humanity, and cursed himself to be a pig. Miyazaki stated that "When a man becomes middle-aged, he becomes a pig". It seems that Porco is carrying a lot of baggage, and that has something to do with him quitting being a human.

The official story goes as follows: Captain Marco Pagot (named after an Italian animator, who is a friend of Miyazaki) was an ace pilot of the Italian Air Force during World War I. He quit the IFA since he saw fascism on the rise, and he wanted to fly following his own will. He became a bounty hunter, assuming the name "Porco Rosso". He crossed out his own face as a young man in the picture that Gina had hung on the wall of her restaurant, so that no one would know what he looked like as a human.

Miyazaki said that Porco once intended to marry Gina, but then World War I broke out, and Gina was living on an island which was Austrian territory. As a military officer, he could not bring himself to marry an enemy national. Torn between his loyalty to his home country and his love for Gina, he chose his country. But when he witnessed the deaths of his fellow pilots, including that of his best friend (Gina's husband), he started wondering about the meaning of his actions, and the meaning of flying and dying for his country. Unable to resolve the conflicts in his mind, he became a pig.

Q: What is Porco's plane?

Savoia S.21. There is actually a real Italian made Savoia S.21, but it doesn't look much like the one Porco flies. Miyazaki didn't know much about the real S.21 when he designed Porco's plane. His design came from a plane he saw when he was a boy. Porco's S.21 looks somewhat like the Macchi M.33.

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Q: What is Curtis's plane?

Curtiss Model R3C-0. The RC3-0 is a pretty close copy of the R3C-2. In the manga, it was explained that Donald Chuck (Donald Curtis in the movie) modified R3C-2 to turn it into a fighter plane. R3C-2 is a race plane, which Jimmy Doolittle (yes, the "30 Seconds Over Tokyo" Doolittle) flew to win the 1925 Schneider Cup, beating Italian Macchi M33 (which looks like Porco’s S.21). In the movie, Piccolo said it (Curtiss the plane, not Curtis the pilot) won in 1927, but in reality, Flight Lt. S.N. Webster of England won the 1927 Schneider Cup race with his Supermarine S-5.

All of the aircraft in "Porco" are "almost" real planes—Feralin's MC72 was, like the Curtiss, a racing plane. And the Italian Air Force's S/M S.55s are also real, but not quite like that. The plane Porco was piloting during World War I was Macchi M.5.

Q: What is the "Schneider Cup"?

Created by Jacques Schneider in 1913, the Schneider Cup, or "La Coupe d'Aviation Maritime Jacques Schneider" was a seaplane race, entered mostly by British, Italians, and Americans, with the best of their airplanes (a sort of "America's Cup" today). After World War I, the race was reopened in 1919 and was held until 1931. Italy won it in 1920 with the Savoia S.12 (not S.21). By the way, one of the Italian pilots in 1926 and 1927 races was named Capt. Artoro Ferrarin.

Q: What does "Mamma Aiuto" mean?

It means "Help, Mama!" in Italian. (However, "Mamma aiuto" is an unusual form, very colloquial. "Aiuto Mamma" is more correct.) We don't know if this was meant to scare poor victims to scream "Mamma Aiuto!", or since those gangs were so pathetic (thanks to Porco), they were screaming "Mamma Aiuto!". ^_^

Q: What do those Italian newspaper headlines say?

The newspaper the pirates were reading at Gina's hotel read:

The newspaper Porco was reading on the way to Milan reads:

Q: When Porco saw Piccolo's engine, he said "It's Folgore!". What does that mean?

Folgore means "lightning" in Italian. It's the model of the engine (Fiat Folgore A.S.2), but we don't know why Miyazaki chose the name Folgore. In the manga, "Folgore" is the name of Porco's plane, not its engine. In "3000 Miles in Search of Mother", the TV anime series Miyazaki worked on, "Folgore" is the name of the ship which the Italian boy, Marco (from Genova, as Porco is) took to Argentina to look for his mother.

Q: What was the song Gina was singing in the bar?

"Le Temps des Cerises (The Time of Cherries)", lyrics by J.B. Clement, music by A. Renard. The song is about Paris Commune, and is subtly telling the Porco's feeling towards the days which are gone now. It was actually sung by the voice actress of Gina, KATO Tokiko. Ms. Kato is a very famous chanteuse in Japan, and her image suits Gina very well. She also wrote and sang the ending song, "Toki niha Mukashi no Hanashi wo (Once in a While, Talk of the Old Days)". For the translation of the lyrics of these songs, check the script.

Q: What was the movie Porco was watching in a theater in Milan?

It's Miyazaki's homage to old cartoons such as the Fleischers' (the Fleischer brothers also did "Superman", to which Miyazaki paid homage in "Farewell Beloved Lupin"), and a Windsor McKay cartoon (McKay also wrote "Little Nimo", of which Miyazaki once tried to make a film.)

Q: When Porco first tried his new plane, Fio said "the aileron's been hit by water". What is an aileron?

The aileron is a control surface on the main wing that is connected to the wing with a hinge. It rotates a few degrees up and down to control air flow around the wing, helping the plane to turn by raising one wing and lowering the other.

Q: Then Fio said "Use the tab!" What is the tab?

"Tabs," short for trim tabs, are small devices on the rear of vertical and horizontal stabilizers (i.e., the tail section) and/or the wings of an aircraft. They represented an important break- through in aviation technology that greatly helps to stabilize (that is, to balance) the plane during level flight. Porco had to use it since in this scene, the tip of left wing is in the water, so the aileron can't supply any aerodynamic force to make the plane fly. So, another control surface, the tab, has to produce aerodynamic force to balance the airplane for level flight.

Q: What was the strange cloud which Porco told Fio about?

It's a cloud made of dead pilots and their planes making their last flight. The story is taken from Roald Dahl's "They Shall Not Grow Old" in "Over to You: Ten Stories of Flyers and Flying", 1946. Miyazaki says he loves Dahl's stories about pilots and planes (Dahl was in the Royal Air Force during World War II), though he doesn't much care for his children's stories such as "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory".

Q: Are there some in-jokes in "Porco"?

Porco's rebuilt plane's new engine has "GHIBLI" embossed on the cylinder head. The engine is actually a FIAT A.S.2, though there's no explicit mention in the movie. The real one had an emboss of FIAT instead of GHIBLI.

Q: Did Porco become a human again?

The general consensus is, yes (though whether he stayed human is another matter). Curtis was insisting on seeing Porco's face, implying something had changed about it. The conversation between Porco and Fio at the camp set up the "kiss the frog prince" theory, so Fio's kiss (and Gina's love) at the end did turn Porco back into a human. He became a pig because he was disillusioned with humanity, but Fio's innocence made him feel that "there is still some hope for humans", as Porco said. This time, he won, and he did not "make another girl unhappy". It seems that he finally overcame his self-hatred.

Q: Did Gina win her bet?

That is a secret between Gina and Fio. ^_^ The general consensus is, she did. We don't see her waiting in the garden in the last scene. Also, Porco's plane is docked near Gina's private garden when Fio flies over near the end. Miyazaki said that in the scene where Porco remembers what happened during World War I, Porco (then Marco) was on plane No. 4, because he is (to be) the 4th husband of Gina (and Berlini, Gina's first husband, was on plane No. 1 :).

Q: I heard there is an English dub. Is it true?

Yes. It was dubbed by Carl Macek, and shown on JAL trans-Pacific flights. It's a so-so dub, and for some reason, the last line about Gina's bet wasn't in the dub. The dub has been included in the Ghibli LD Box Set (English on the right analog track). However, Disney will redub it for the US releases. The French have been luckier than Americans. They got Jean Reno as Porco in the French dub.

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