The movies to me feel like they focus a lot more on making something beautifully animated/fun to look at, and that they focus more on telling a specific narrative arc, whereas the anime focuses more on, like, conveying an "issue"/feeling. Whenever I watch the movies, I feel this sort of sense of distance where it feels very clearly like you're watching characters undergoing their own struggles, but there isn't the same ability to identify with them like there is in the anime. To a certain extent, the problems are ones that exist in the modern world (bullying in the "workplace", exploitation of women, etc etc), but the overall vibe is something that feels much more like a fantasy court drama and it's difficult to feel a similar sense of connection.

The character's struggles and plot arcs/the reasons for the mononoke have a complexity in the anime that makes them feel a lot "closer" to the viewer. They feel both harder and easier to understand; like the surface level fears (exploitation, taboo love, abusive relationships, etc) are pretty easy to pick up on, but underneath that are a lot of layers that individuals can connect to. The setting fades into the background and doesn't really obstruct the viewer's ability to see themselves mirrored in the plot/characters.

I think the other big thing for me is how the mononoke are treated and how the exorcisms are portrayed. The movies feel a lot like they wanted to animate beautiful fight scenes, which they did succeed in, but that emphasis on the fight scene waters down the purpose of the medicine seller in my opinion. They feel like they turn the mononoke into something "other" and it gives the vibe that they're something that can just be eradicated with a single swift act of violence. There isn't really the same emphasis of digging down to the root of the issue and understanding all the complex (and frequently structural) factors that led to the creation of the mononoke. It puts the mononoke into the box of something that is simply bad and it cannot exist because it's innately bad, whereas the anime portrays the mononoke as something that exists as a consequence of the situation and its existence is more of a tragedy rather than an embodiment of evil. There's a sympathy for the mononoke in the anime that the movie doesn't really portray, in my opinion. I think the anime also does a much better job of not really being "judgemental" towards the characters and their struggles – it acknowledges that their actions caused harm, but also acknowledges that a lot of their decisions were a direct consequence of the social structures and expectations they existed within; it addresses why someone acted immorally instead of just judging them for being immoral/treating it as an innate personal flaw (which, to be fair to the movies, they do that to a certain extent too, but I don't think they manage to convey the nuance in the same way). There also is a sense of grief about the exorcism in the anime, that its destruction was a necessity because of the circumstances but not something that will truly fix the root causes, that I don't really feel in the movies (potentially because of how the fight sequences are animated more like they're an action movie).

domestic utenanthy..!!!