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Ghibli Hangs Anti-Nuclear Power Banner on Rooftop
posted on by Egan Loo
Studio Ghibli, the anime company known for Princess Mononoke, Grave of the Fireflies, the Oscar-winning Spirited Away, and other films, hung a banner against nuclear power on its rooftop on Friday. The banner read "Studio Ghibli wa Gen-Patsu Nuki no Denki de Eiga o Tsukuritai" or "Studio Ghibli Wants to Make Movies With Electricity That Isn't From Nuclear Power." The banner can be seen from the trains on the nearby bridge of the Chūō, a major east-west line of Japan Railways in the Tokyo area.
Word spread about the banner via Twitter on Friday morning. When asked about the banner by the magazine Alterna, Ghibli said, "We have no comment to press inquiries."
During a March 28 press conference, studio co-founder Hayao Miyazaki compared the March 11 accident at the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant to the uncontrollability of fire that mankind received from the Greek deity Prometheus.
Japan — and Tokyo's Kanto area in particular where Ghibli is located — has been undergoing scheduled power outages and conservation efforts since the Great Eastern Japan Earthquake disaster (Higashi Nihon Daishinsai). At the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant, staff members have been working since March 11 to prevent the reactor fuel rods from melting after the cooling systems were damaged by the earthquake-induced tsunami. Other plants, both nuclear and non-nuclear, have been disabled or running at reduced power output.
On Saturday, the three-month anniversary of the disaster, thousands of protesters held demonstrations against nuclear power in the streets of Tokyo.
Source: Alterna
Image via Takashi Murakami
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