n 1984, an American video company released Warriors of the Wind, a butchered version of Japanese writer/director Hayao Miyazaki's powerful animated film adaptation of his comic-book series Nausicaä of the Valley of Wind. As author Helen McCarthy reports in her guidebook Hayao Miyazaki: Master of Japanese Animation, Miyazaki and his longtime filmmaking partner Isao Takahata were appalled by the choppy, abbreviated American edit, and began denying distribution rights to foreign companies. Miyazaki has directed most of his best work since then, but it's taken nearly 20 years for some of his films to get full-scale American releases. But Disney finally persuaded Miyazaki's Studio Ghibli to take the plunge, and it's offering three of the Japanese writer/director's projects all at once, available individually or as a DVD three-pack.
Fresh from an American theatrical run and a Best Animated Feature win at the Academy Awards, Miyazaki's latest film, Spirited Away, is the story of a fearful, belligerent 10-year-old girl who's trapped in the spirit world after her parents make some particularly poor choices. Initially, a mysterious boy named Haku helps her adapt and find a small measure of safety. But before long she's not only trying to live up to her new responsibilities to the spirits around her, she's trying to rescue Haku and her parents as well as herself.
Kiki's Delivery Service is one of Miyazaki's cheeriest and most conflict-free films, on a par with his all-time classic My Neighbor Totoro. It follows a 13-year-old witch who, in accordance with family tradition, has to move to a new city and make her own way in the world. She quickly finds a wonderful place of her own and begins the sometimes scary but always rewarding process of learning to take care of herself and trust in her own abilities.
Finally, Castle in the Sky is a sprawling epic about two orphans: Pazu, whose father once photographed a mysterious floating sky-city, and Sheeta, whose mystically powered pendant is somehow linked to that city. With numerous thieves and thugs on their tails, the children flee together and share a series of fearsome adventures in the process.
Ambitious, award-winning anime
Disney's Miyazaki releases leave a few things to be desired—Kiki and Castle are notably short on DVD extras. Each film does boast an extra disc, but only to include the entire movie in storyboard form; the original discs mostly boast trailers and short, fluffy "behind the microphone" squibs. At least Spirited Away goes further, with its making-of documentary and featurettes.
No matter—the films themselves are the exciting thing, and anime fans on both sides of the great dub/sub divide should be relatively happy with these bilingual releases. (Spirited Away and Castle also have French-language options, while Kiki boasts a Spanish track.) The dubs tend toward blandness, especially on the Castle soundtrack; Anna Paquin as Sheeta and James Van Der Beek as Pazu make for a remarkably flat, whitebread-sounding couple. At least Phil Hartman sounds like he's enjoying himself, hamming it up as a snarky black cat in Kiki. The Spirited Away dub, with Lilo & Stitch star Daveigh Chase in the lead role, is again the best of the three by far.
Dubs aside, these three films are unmissable. Spirited Away is a particular winner—by now, Miyazaki has just about perfected his blend of coming-of-age adventure, drama and comedy. Spirited Away is visually magnificent and authentically creepy. Castle, meanwhile, ranks with his best, largely for its ambitious visuals and expansive, exciting storyline, which ranges widely in tone but preserves an authentic sense of wonder. By comparison, Kiki seems intended for much younger viewers; it's sweet, endearing and energetic but distinctly toothless.
While the three films vary in gravity, they share some common threads: All three feature breathtakingly detailed animation, the lovely soundtrack music of Joe Hisaishi and Miyazaki's distinctive episodic scripting, which brings the vivid joys and terrors of childhood to life through symbolic fantasy. Miyazaki's career obsession with flight and flying machines crops up in each case, sending characters soaring above the clouds and high over their beautifully realized worlds. Whether portraying raw, happy innocence or the first troubled stirrings of maturity, Miyazaki brings a focus and attention to his work that few others can match, and it's high time that American audiences got to know him better.
