'CASTLE' MOVES IN UNEXPECTED WAYS.

Byline: David Kronke Staff Writer

AMERICAN animated films in the past few years have, with the gratifying exception of ``The Incredibles,'' been virtually kid-only affairs, with obligatory gags for older viewers feeling perfunctory, even lame. Which is what makes the spectacular anime of Hayao Miyazaki's such heartening family viewing.

Miyazaki's last film, the Oscar-winner ``Spirited Away,'' and his latest, ``Howl's Moving Castle,'' boast an emotional depth that makes the average Hollywood blockbuster feel like Saturday-morning fodder, and are combined with visuals so richly more spectacular than summer comic-book movies made on three or four times the budget.

While stars voicing Hollywood's animated spectacles represent a who's- who of of-the-moment pop-culture, voices for the American version of ``Howl's Moving Castle'' include those of Jean Simmons (``Guys and Dolls''), Lauren Bacall, Blythe Danner and Billy Crystal, names that may not have kid appeal but mean something to their parents (or, even, grandparents).

So this one's for the adults. By all means, take the kids, even though they may have a hard time following all the particulars in the admittedly serpentine plot. Chances are they'll be too busy being bedazzled by Miyazaki's mind-bending visuals, which amplify the work of animation pioneer Winsor McKay and are every bit as trippy as any of Little Nemo's excursions into Slumberland.

The castle of the movie's title is an extravagant edifice waddling along on mechanical birds' feet through an apparently European countryside where smoke-clogged factories of drearily modernized society co-exist with magical realms of wizards and witches. Howl himself (voiced by Christian Bale) is a seemingly good-hearted if terribly vain wizard (he broods over changes in his hair color) whose ambulatory home boasts a door that opens into any number of exits, including both sides of an ominously brewing war.

Though entreated by both sides to contribute to the war effort, Howl wants nothing to do with it, grandly proclaiming that those who participate in war will ``never turn back into humans.'' (And this coming from Disney, who last year famously refused to distribute the anti-war ``Fahrenheit 9/11.'')

Along the way, Howl's haunt picks up a straggler, Sophie, a dutifully unhappy youngster (Emily Mortimer) transformed into an elderly woman (Simmons) by the mercurial Witch of the Waste (Bacall). Grandma Sophie, as she comes to be called, becomes far more comfortable in her body than the youthful Sophie ever was, and manages not only to help end the war but also to reclaim Howl's lost soul and her own innocence.

Well, we warned you that the story line was dense, and we haven't even mentioned the delightfully creepy blob-monsters, the poetically mute turnip-headed scarecrow, the rapturously lazy palace dog or the cantankerous burning embers (Crystal) powering Howl's edifice.

Suffice it to say, no amount of description can prepare you for the visceral nature of the visual astonishments Miyazaki has created. Though it meanders a bit too much near the end in its use of metaphor and narrative sophistication, ``Howl's Moving Castle'' stone-cold surpasses the season's ostensibly ``adult'' films, ``Crash'' and ``Cinderella Man.''

``When you're old, all you want to do is stare at the scenery,'' Grandma Sophie observes at one point. When the scenery has been so lovingly imagined by Miyazaki, here's betting younger viewers will find themselves reasonably enraptured, as well.

David Kronke, [phone]

david.kronke(at)dailynews.com

HOWL'S MOVING CASTLE - Three and one half stars

(PG: frightening images and brief, mild language.)

Starring: Featuring the voices of Christian Bale, Jean Simmons, Emily Mortimer, Billy Crystal, Lauren Bacall, Blythe Danner.

Director: Hayao Miyazaki.

Running time: 1 hr. 59 min.

Playing: In wide release.

In a nutshell: A young girl turned elderly by a witch teams with a wizard while their land prepares for war. Miyazaki's visual imagination is mind-blowing and nearly relentless, though you're forgiven for finding the story line too fussily complicated.

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Photo:

Howl, a wizard voiced by Christian Bale, left, protects young Sophie (Emily Mortimer) in ``Howl's Moving Castle,'' from the Oscar-winning animator Hayao Miyazaki.