JA4LL, Buddipole, and IC-7000 in the movie Ponyo


The Japanese anime film Ponyo contains an extended sequence involving ham radio.

In the beginning of the scene, the character Lisa (voiced by Tina Fey in the English dub) sets up what appears to be a Buddipole, and then returns indoors to call her husband at sea. The scene changes to a close-up of a radio very much like an ICOM IC-7000 ham radio, and Lisa tunes to 50.194.40 MHz in the 6-meter band and begins transmit, giving her call as JA4LL. Lisa's son Sosuke and the eponymous Ponyo then shout "HAM" into the microphone, a reference to Ponyo's recent discovery of her fondness for salt-cured ham, but also possibly an inside joke.

Later, a few more shots of the antenna with its salt-water ground plane show an understanding of what a de luxe DX-pedition destination the newly-flooded hill would be.

Below are some screenshots from the film to illustrate my point.

Other people have posted some clips from the film, but it's not clear they'll remain.


buddipole-1
buddipole-1

buddipole-2
buddipole-2

ham
ham

ic-7000
ic-7000

ja4ll
ja4ll

salt-water-ground-plane
salt-water-ground-plane


Photo album generated by album from Dave's MarginalHacks on Sun Nov 14 16:38:20 2010