THE FILMS OF STUDIO GHIBLI: KIKI'S DELIVERY SERVICE

Early on in Kiki's Delivery Service, Kiki's mother bemoans the loss of her traditions, wondering who will carry on making medicinal potions after she's gone.  An elderly neighbor reminds her that "things change, little by little," setting the stage for Hayao Miyazaki's 1989 animated film; the story of a young woman striking out on her own, seeking to distinguish her life from the ones lived by her parents.  The fact that our young heroine, Kiki, also happens to be a witch, matters to the story but mostly as a textural device, considering that, with or without the magical dressing, the film's basic thrust involves the chronicling of one young woman's exploration of the world and her identity within it.

The film opens right as Kiki has decided that today will be the day she cuts the apron strings and leaves her parent's home.  She's thirteen years old, traditionally the age when young witches go searching for a town to call their own.  Heading off with her familiar, a black cat named Jiji, she flies unsteadily into the future, unaware of the adventures that await her.

Miyazaki keeps the tone light and the pacing unhurried throughout Kiki's Delivery Service.  There are moments when Kiki must rise to the occasion, necessitating the orchestration of a grand action sequence.  But there's also quite a lot of room made in the film for her to simply wander, explore, and contemplate both her surroundings and her prospects.  Surprisingly enough, the story shrugs off the standard girl or boy with powers conventions; no one she encounters seems all that surprised that she can fly on a broomstick, so there's no time wasted on Kiki denying her base self.  This is a film that looks to empower, not shame, its protagonist (and by extension, it's young viewers).

Funny but not without its share of character-building lessons, the film is fashioned out of the same enchanted materials that power most of Studio Ghibli's output.  Exquisite hand-drawn animation blends with imaginative storytelling that's applicable to real life situations, all without pandering to its target audience or relying on the sort of cheap laughs that routinely appear in lesser works by Dreamworks or Disney (fart jokes, anyone?).  Like its youthful central character, Kiki's Delivery Service is a magical creature with a personality all its own.

Kiki's Delivery Service screens as a part of the retrospective series, Castles in the Sky: Miyazaki, Takahata, and the Masters of Studio Ghibli.  More info about the Studio Ghibli series here.
It plays at the NW Film Center's Whitsell Auditorium (in the Portland Art Museum) on Friday, May 11th at 7pm, Saturday, May 12th at 1pm, and Sunday, May 13th at 1pm.
The film will be presented in the original Japanese w/ English subtitles.  


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THE FILMS OF STUDIO GHIBLI: MY NEIGHBOR TOTORO

Okay, I'll admit it: I'd never seen My Neighbor Totoro or the majority of the output from the geniuses at Studio Ghibli until very recently.  That's part of the pleasure of writing for the newsroom site (as well as covering NWFC content on the blog); since a good chunk of what's programmed at the NW Film Center is repertory-based, I get the chance to wax philosophical about old favorites as well as other works of note that may have passed me by somewhere down the line.

So, yeah, many of you have probably seen the film more than a few times with your kids, grandchildren or friends.  But, since it's new to me, I'm going to willfully ignore everyone else's superior knowledge of all things Totoro and just let this play out as if we're all looking at a new, unbelievably great anime.  (The author takes a deep calming breath).  Okay, here we go...

Two young girls, Satsuki and Mei, move into a large, dusty house with their father, preparing the home for when their convalescing mother is well enough to rejoin the family.  The girls waste no time, rushing to explore their new surroundings and, what do you know, they happens upon otherworldly creatures, unlocking a world teeming with magical possibilities.

I know what you're thinking; these are fairly standard tropes within both children's stories and coming of age flicks.  My Neighbor Totoro, however, is no common children's entertainment.  It's a wondrous work of beauty that takes familiar elements and blends them into a highly accessible, ageless masterpiece that transcends cultural and generational barriers.

The animated feature hails from 1988, long before Disney turned Hayao Miyazaki into a household name in the West.  With Totoro, Miyazaki draws more than a little from the atmospherics (and some of the imagery) of Lewis Carroll's most famous story.  It's impossible to watch Mei travel through the arched thicket without being reminded of Alice's trip through the rabbit hole.

Miyazaki would later dip again into Carroll's iconic tale when making Spirited Away (2001), but, between the Cheshire cat-like bus and the white "rabbit" (or whatever it is) spirit that Mei bounds after through a field of tall grass, Totoro's borrowing of these recognizable features feels more in line with the sense of discovery forwarded in Carroll's writing than it does in that later film.

Discovery is what drives this film.  And Mei and her older sister findings aren't limited to just Totoro and his spirit companions.  As the story progresses, the girls deal with some fairly advanced emotional material: worries about the future, their mother, each other.  It brings to mind what Slavoj Žižek says in Sophie Fiennes' The Pervert's Guide to the Cinema about how to read the films of Alfred Hitchcock.  Žižek observes that if one peels away the supernatural or fantastical event, it's far easier to see what is really happening in the story.

Read this way, Totoro reveals itself as a film about the anxiety felt when first entering into the knowledge of harsh universal truths, such as coming to terms with the vulnerability of loved ones and, by extension, one's own mortality.  It's pretty heavy content for a kids film but, in Miyazaki's masterful hands, it's deftly balanced with a boundless sense of wonder that lifts the work into the stratosphere, where hope can fly in the face of despair. 

My Neighbor Totoro screens as a part of the retrospective series, Castles in the Sky: Miyazaki, Takahata, and the Masters of Studio Ghibli.  More info about the Studio Ghibli series here.
It plays at the NW Film Center's Whitsell Auditorium (in the Portland Art Museum) on Saturday, May 5th at 4pm and Sunday, May 6th at 7pm.  
The film will be presented in the original Japanese w/ English subtitles. 


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