8 min read · Jul 24, 2023
When Marnie Was There is a Japanese anime film about a young 12-year-old girl named Anna. She suffers from asthma, depression, and narcolepsy. Anna has very few friends and says a few times that she hates herself. She says that she is ugly, moody, stupid, and unpleasant and wishes to be normal. Anna says that there is this magic circle and she lives outside the circle. Things got so bad that she called another girl a “fat pig”.
Director Yonebashi directed both The Secret World of Arrietty and When Marnie Was There and both are great films. The film was released in 2014. Stars Hailee Steinfeld and Kiernan Shipka as Anna and Marnie in the English Dub. Kiernan Shipka is best known for her roles in The Legend of Korra and Sabrina.
Anna’s parents died when she was a toddler and she then stayed with her grandmother. Her grandmother passed away when she was two. Since Anna had no living relatives, she went to live with her foster mother Yoriko, and her husband. Anna lives in the city of Sapporo, on the island of Hokkaido in Japan. Anna calls Yoriko Auntie. Yoriko worries a lot about Anna and her health. Anna just found out that her parents have been getting subsidies from the government to pay for Anna’s expenses after finding a letter. Yoriko could not understand why Anna was so expressionless, stoned-faced, and quiet. Explaining to the doctor after an asthma attack that Anna used to be a vibrant child.
At the doctor’s recommendation, Yoriko sends Anna to stay with relatives in the country, the Oiwas. The doctor thinks that the clean air will be good for Anna. Anna stays with Kiyomasa and his wife Setsu Oiwa at their beautiful country home just down the street from a beach with a marsh. Across the marsh is an old abandoned but beautiful mansion. According to Oiwas, the mansion has not been lived in for years. They advise that Anna stay away but Anna is intrigued and she keeps going back.
Anna goes down to the beach after a rough night out with some other girls at the Tanabata Festival. The other girls were kind of loud and in her face. Anna did not really want to attend the festival. Everyone at the festival was writing their wishes on paper and hanging them from trees. Anna wrote that she wished she could be normal every day. When Anna got down to the beach there was a rowboat with a candle inside. Anna had seen Marnie in the window in her dreams and she figures that this boat must belong to her. She haphazardly rows it across the marsh.
Anna arrives at the mansion in the boat when she meets Marnie running out to meet her. Marnie had tied the boat onto the other shore. She had been watching Anna. Marnie was competent at rowing a boat and brought Anna back to the other shore.
Marnie is a spirit girl or rather an apparition or ghost or a memory but either way, she was real. She is beautiful, blonde-haired, and blue-eyed. Marnie, like Anna, looks like she is 12 years old. Marnie is dressed like a porcelain doll. The clothes that her parents and their friends wear look very similar to what Jackie Kennedy wore in the early 1960s. Marnie was physically and emotionally abused by her grandmother and the maids. Her grandmother would pull her by the arm and brush her hair so forcefully. The maids told her that naughty children get locked in the old abandoned silo up on the hill. One night they dragged her up there to lock her in the silo, but a storm came just in time and they ran home. Her negligent parents would only come home once in a while. Marnie only saw her father twice a year. Marnie loved her parents and they would hold big parties and she would get a new dress and get to dance with her crush Kuzuhiko.
The next night comes and Marnie shows up in the rowboat and suggests that she and Anna go on a picnic across the lake. Marnie on the way teaches Anna how to row a boat by guiding her hands and arms. They get to the landing and Marnie suggests that they ask each other three questions every night so that they don’t get bored with one another.
Marnie then suggests that they go attend her parent's party. Marnie gets dressed in a new pink dress and gives Anna one of her grandmother’s shawls. Anna is not a big partygoer and is obviously not comfortable around the party guest. Anna is invited as a flower girl. Marnie’s mother asks to buy a flower and calls her a little witch. Other people offer to buy flowers, shoving money in Anna’s face. Anna ran out. Marnie eventually did join Anna outside after dancing with Kuzuhiko and they did a waltz together.
Marnie then goes away for a week. After meeting Marnie Anna looks so much happier and cheerier. She makes friends with one of the new residents of the mansion, 12-year-old Sayaka. Sayaka at first thinks that Anna is Marnie. Sayaka lives in Marnie’s old room behind the blue window. She found Marnie’s old diary behind the bookcase. Marnie had done all those things she had done with Anna but either with someone else or by herself. Kuzuhiko was mentioned a lot in the diary. The pages about the silo were missing.
Marnie finds Anna drawing and they go hunting in the woods for mushrooms. There they divulge their deepest secrets. Anna tells Marnie about finding her foster parent’s letter from the government. Marnie tells Anna that she is lucky to have someone who actually cares about her. Marnie tells Anna her secret about her family. Anna suggests that they go up to the old silo to combat Marnie’s fears. According to Kennedy-Moore, this is an example of “intimate, Mutually Shared Relationships: “Caring and Sharing”. (Kennedy-Moore, 2012).
They head up there and on the way up the hill Marnie keeps calling Anna Kuzuhiko and then just disappears. Sayaka shows up with the missing pages from the diary and suggests they read it together but Anna keeps heading up to the silo. There she finds Marnie and Marnie is still calling her Kuzuhiko. They stay together and Anna falls asleep. In her dreams, the real Kuzuhiko shows up and takes Marnie home. Anna is later found asleep on the road by Sayaka and her brother.
Anna has another dream about Marnie. Marnie asks for her forgiveness. She says that Anna disappeared when she fell asleep and that she is leaving. Anna forgave her.
Sayaka found something else behind her bookshelf. She found a painting of the mansion by Hisako. Hisako is a local painter who is still alive and was friends with Marnie. She told Anna about the real Marnie. Marnie’s adult life was even more tragic than her childhood. Her daughter and husband died. We the audience learn that she was Anna’s Grandmother.
I know that this movie is about tragedy and getting over the loss of a loved one, but it is also about friendship too. Anna in the beginning was not getting along with other children or adults. She had no friends. Her confidence and self-esteem were non-existent. She called Noboku a fat pig. She hated herself. But after becoming friends with Marnie and spending time with her, Anna’s mood, self-esteem, and confidence began to change. She was much more likable by the end of the movie. Through Marnie, she learned how to make friends and be friends with Sayaka and Hisako, and Toitchi. They all wanted her to come back the next summer. She apologized to Noboku for her words. Yoriko was so happy about her change in attitude. Marnie helped Anna to open up to others and let herself be happy.
Who knows what would have happened to Anna if Marnie and then later Sayaka had not come along? Since Anna lost her parents and her grandmother at such a young age she is more inclined to develop peer isolation, anger, guilt, loneliness, anxiety, post-traumatic stress, thoughts of suicide, low self-esteem, and depression. (Nguyen & Scott, 2012). According to Sakyi, Melachoir, Surkan, Fombonne & Chollet “ In childhood and adolescence, friendships offer an environment in which children are able to develop social competencies and build their self-esteem, skills that are essential for good mental health throughout life. Moreover, friends can be a source of emotional and instrumental support, and help youth access different types of material and symbolic resources that favor well-being” (Sakyi, K. S., Surkan, P. J., Fombonne, E., Chollet, A., & Melchior, M. (2015).
I love the film and how it shows that everyone has problems. Anna never acts like everything is okay. Anna shows that she has some deep mental health issues through her behavior. Marnie however puts up a front and acts like she is okay when in truth she is being abused daily. Marnie hides her problems behind her charming personality. According to the story told by Hisako, it sounded like Marnie’s friends were aware that she was getting abused.
I personally think that every kid (and adult too) needs someone like Marnie to love them unconditionally and reach out to them when they need help. I was in Big Brothers Big Sisters and I waited over a year and a half for a Little but never got matched. I kept waiting because I know that reaching out to someone like Anna did can make a huge impact. I think that the movie is great. I will in the future write a comparison of the book to the movie.
Resources
Robinson, J. G. (n.d.). When Marnie Was There. HBO Max. Retrieved April 8, 2022, from https://www.hbomax.com/feature/urn:hbo:feature:GXrHTGwLxKKu9KwEAAAAJ
Sakyi, K. S., Surkan, P. J., Fombonne, E., Chollet, A., & Melchior, M. (2015). Childhood friendships and psychological difficulties in young adulthood: an 18-year follow-up study. European child & adolescent psychiatry, 24(7), 815–826. https://doi.org/10.1007/s00787-014-0626-8
Nguyen, H. T., & Scott, A. N. (2012, November 30). Self-concept and depression among children who experienced the death of a family member. Hartness Library. Retrieved April 8, 2022, from https://eric.ed.gov/?q=%22death%22&pg=22&id=EJ1010323
