Hayao Miyazaki is a famous Japanese animation filmmaker, and his work has introduced me personally to Japanese anime. He has major impacts not only on Japanese society and culture, but he brought Japanese anime to mainstream audiences in America. In particular, his 2001 film Spirited Away won the Academy Award for Best Animated Feature at the 75th Academy Awards. His wondrous and beautiful animations often hold dark themes, with the loss of nature, the brutality of mankind, and the loss of innocence. He is able to insert adult themes into animations of mainly children, especially young girls. All these themes are threaded in beautiful animations, almost like a psychological portrait of the minds of these complex characters.
I also want to share the beautiful artwork of Miyazaki here because it is so fantastic how he captures both magic with realism, capturing and connecting the audience to a mystical world he has created.
If you want a gateway into a Miyazaki film, I recommend Spirited Away. It is not only my favorite Miyazaki film but my favorite film in general because of the fantastical world he has created. The film has multiple twists and turns, an incredible rollercoaster, in addition to the amazing artwork and animation. This film really defined my childhood, engaging in the childlike wonder of discovering a mystical world with spirits, but also introduced a sense of maturity and realism.
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Connie Pan · April 17, 2022 at 4:15 am
I was first introduced to Miyazaki and Studio Ghibli in fourth grade, when my friend showed Howl’s Moving Castle at her birthday sleepover. My brother also really really liked Studio Ghibli when he was in high school, so we watched Spirited Away and Ponyo and The Wind Rises and so many others. They were gorgeous. I really liked how much they made me want to draw, and imagine, and feel. Miyazaki said about his own work once that he wants people to look at his work and be more apt to find the beauty in the little things about their own lives, because there is so much beauty in small, quiet moments, and I adored that.
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