This film, a Fantasy Action and Adventure is surprisingly violent with a couple of battle scenes where people
(mostly soldiers) are loosing their limbs and their heads and this is easily the goriest Miyazaki film i've seen.
A fantasy adventure from the mythic times when Man co-existed with Gods (of Nature) and Japan was covered
by dense forests. As in his early 1984 film "Nausicaa" Miyazaki is deeply pessimistic and critical of humans
devastating destructive influence on the environment, and in both in the 1986 "Laputa - Castle in the Sky" and
in this film people, or soldiers, and a lot of them, die in gory ways. The regular people polluting in "The Princess
Mononoke" don't necessary deserve to die but all soldiers and merchants of death do, Miyazaki seems to say.

The film takes place in fantasy time but if real time, due to the type of rifles used, it should be late medieval
times probably (15th century?) Another Miyazaki and Ghibli film with an ecological message.
I re-watched these film at the end of March 2023, twenty ears since i watched it the first time, and now I noticed
more clearly Miyazaki's dark view on Humanity and it's negative effect on Earth.

The Princess Mononoke:

When protecting his village, warrior Ashitaka fights a giant Demon Boar and gets wounded with a demon scar.
A village magic woman tells him that this curse is deadly and that only a God can cure him from his wound.
Ashitaka goes west, riding on his faithful deer Yakul, in search of "The Forest of the Deer God" and on his way
he sees evil soldiers attacking a village and killing the civilians. The Samurai seems to enjoy the slaughter and
Ashitaka kills some of them with his powerful arrow (Demon arrows?) ripping off their arms and heads.

He arrives to the sacred forest where he sees a lot of Kodamos (small forest spirits), a girl with Wolves - San the
Wolf Princess (as Mowgli a human child raised by wolves), a wolf God - Moro and also a glimpse of the Deer God.
Just outside of the forest lies the iron mining village of Lady Eboshi, with the surrounding hills deforested and
with clouds of pollution around it. The Empereror sends a Samurai army to take over the iron ore rich village
and both the army and Lady Eboshi wants to kill the Deer God and all the animals of the forest to exploit it's
riches. There will be a war between humans and the Gods and the animals of the Forest. Evil vs. Good.

The film presented in widescreen 1.85:1 with japanese audio DTS-HD MA 5.1 and with swedish subtitles. Extra
some Trailer and Teasers