A Letter To Momo
“A Letter to Momo,” from veteran Japanese animator Hiroyuki Okiura, features many of the elements that have become familiar to fans of the lyrical animated epics of Hayao Miyazaki and his heirs, including a beguiling color palette; finely rendered images of water, greenery and rustic Japanese architecture; and a story shot through with loss, discovery and mystical animism. Many of those tropes are skillfully deployed in “A Letter to Momo,” Okiura’s sophomore feature, which makes it seem churlish to note that the overall enterprise winds up being glum, repetitive and baggy at an overlong two hours. The story, of a girl coming to terms with the recent death of her father with the help of three goblins from the spirit world, owes more than a little to the far superior classic “My Neighbor Totoro.” The Momo of the title is Momo Miyaura, who has moved from Tokyo to Shio Island with her mother in the wake of her father’s death. Haunted by her final argument with her dad, Mo...