That ending is one of the key reasons I don't think I can watch the movie again. It's a fantastic movie, but I just...can't put myself through that again.
I've watched
Kaguya twice, and it's so much more devastating the second time round. When you know what's coming, it
feels like you're watching a video reel of a young child who you know died at 14. All the cuteness, all the exhilaration, all the growth, all of it replaced with an irrevocable emptiness. Merely thinking of the music that starts to play when then moon people arrive is getting me worked up. Kaguya tends to fly under the radar a lot, but it's in like the top 3 of every Ghibli movie ranking for a reason.
I also saw
Star Wars: A New Hope for the first time in like 17 years today, and in theaters too. It's kinda hard to try to assess this movie in any kind of objective manner because it's so foundational, so I don't really have a choice but to put it at 10/10.
It holds up, and always will. It's one of the most quintessential hero's journeys in all of fiction. It's simple, but not basic. The characterization is extremely strong, as is the chemistry between the actors. You believe every word that comes out of their mouths. This time I really took notice of just how iconic and well done the visual design of everything is. Every place, character and location is extremely distinct, and the world has the perfect amount of detail and wear that it feels genuinely lived in. The pacing is about perfect. The score moves mountains. The effects are perfect sans the stupid CG additions the special edition did, which now just look distractingly bad in pristine 4k. So yeah, even with the oppressive Star Wars glut that's been going on for almost 10 years, it hasn't dimmed the original one bit, and actually makes it shine all the brighter. There's a sense of purity and sincerity to it that's been long absent from anything Star Wars (except maybe Andor, but I haven't seen that).