So the story is about Horikoshi Jirou, who later on went and designed one of the peaks in aviation engineering at the time: the Zero. I'll try to avoid spoiling the meat of the story/development.
The movie starts off with Jirou as a child, how he dreamt of being a airplane designer.
Then it jumps to him as a teenager. Meet's Satomi Naoko for the first time, helps her family relative/servant? and leaves after without leaving his name.
Then it skips to two years later when he was finishing highschool.
Then he was starting his job.
At one point suddenly he is taking a break, where he meets Satomi Naoko at a mountain resort.
Jirou asks Naoko's father for her hand in marriage.
Jirou is seen back at the factory and going about new innovations for aircrafts.
Jirou designs Japan's first full alloy airplane.
Jirou shows that the Zero's are of his design.
Now what is must confusing is not just the sudden jumps in time, but also the sudden jumps between the real world and Jirou's dream world, where he meets his hero, Caproni (aircraft designer) or sometimes without him. Sometimes the stitching between the dream and the real world are so smooth that you are left to question if this story was in fact realistic or fantastic... then poof, you get shown that it was a dream after all. In fact, the last scene where it is revealed that Jirou designed the Zero's was in his dream world too. It is also there that he (or we, at least) learn that Naoko passed away.
Speaking of abrupt time jumps, one most notable part of this is Jirou's little sister Kayo that appears in
1) when they were young (and she was tiny)
2) when he was finishing highschool
3) right after he marries Naoko (already a budding doctor)
4) near the end, where Jirou leaves to test his full metal alloy airplane.
Anyhow, the story had potential. It does feature Jirou sort of juggling between family (incl. spouse), his work and dreams, and duties for his country. The direction it took was a little confusing. The story WAS indeed a sad one, but due to the odd pacing and everything, the audience is not as able to fully impersonate or associate and share the same emotions as the main character. The ending is also rather abrupt... though the theme song is beautiful; the ending credits was done with a series of scene/background image cuts of various places Jirou visited in the past... the two together, plus the fact that you know Naoko has passed away, acts as a flashback and is probably the most emotional part... which is weird! It's the ending credits. Almost did get teary; Naoko is a fine woman and the loss is a shame.
As far as the voice acting goes, there's also a big jump. As some of you may know (from me or other sources), the voice actor for a few of the characters are not professional voice actors. Jirou in his childhood was done by a professional VA. When he got older, his role was given to Anno Hideaki, better known as the director of the latest Evangelion movies. His voice, while not terrible considering the personality of Jirou's character, still kind of keeps you disconnected from the world Miyazaki is creating.
In terms of animation... Ghibli has done it once again with a terribly well done set. Some places are awfully detailed, some places the sheer simplicity is perfect. The character drawings might have gotten a little simpler compared to past works however, and might sometimes feel like they don't fit in the right lighting to the rest of the background. Kayo also was a bit of an odd case IMO, since it feels like even when she grew up her face remained that of a child. In any case, I do have to say that in terms of "graphics" I have nothing against it. Oh, and the earthquake must be the most unnatural looking one (well, what better way to show an earthquake than making it look like fantasy?) but also the most scary one I've seen.
Now one last point I want to make regarding this movie is that for someone that isn't fully versed in Japanese, it's difficult without subtitles (which there was none). Why? There's a of material and mechanical terms. I guess most of that aren't too important to the understanding of the whole story though.
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