Hayao Miyazaki’s award winning “Howl’s Moving Castle” is adapted off a novel by British fantasy writer Diana Wynne Jones. Jones creates a beautiful story in a fantastical world not to different from our own, allowing Miyazaki to produce a charming and yet inventive fairy tale using his talents to create visually strange characters and situations. In the film a young girl named Sophie Hatter is the heroine of the story. Sophie is an 18 year old who becomes cursed by a witch named the Witch Of The Waste. The curse turns Sophie’s body into a old woman’s body, ashamed of her looks Sophie flees trying to find a cure for the curse, along her journey she befriends Howl a handsome wizard, Calcifer a fire demon, Turnip Head and Markl. Throughout the film Sophie undergoes various appearance transformations due to her curse. Director Miyazaki cleverly visualizes these…show more content… After turned into an old women Sophie learns to accept the fate that she is given but still is confronted by insecurity issues on her looks and her purpose in life as she is quoted saying “when you are old all you want to do it stare at the scenery, its so strange, I’ve never felt so peaceful before” (Miyazaki, Howls Moving Castle). In the early moments of this stage Sophie obtains the role as a housekeeper for Howl during which, she lacks ambition to look out for herself, ultimately limiting her qualifications to only a housekeeper, Sophies quoted saying “I’m the cleaning lady. It’s my job to clean” (Miyazaki, Howls Moving Castle). Sophies adaption to becoming an old women results in her character maturing. As an elderly women Sophie shows her wiser side and how she asserts herself confidently as the lady of the house. Becoming the oldest person in Howls moving castle allows Sophie to become a mother figure for Markl and sometimes for Howl. As a mother figure Sophie’s character needs to adapt maturity in situations thrown her