My Neighbor Totoro - Reaction

[Japan]

A lovely, creative, magical animated film about two sisters moving to a new house in the countryside near a forest, and the fantastic, extraordinary creatures they meet. With such a strong imagination and sense of wonder pervading the film, it's good for kids or anyone like me with a childlike curiosity about the world. Although it's a simple story playing out in a benign, innocent world with no bad guys -everyone, even the strange creatures, in this film is both good and cute-, it still captures the heart. Especially noteworthy is the fun musical theme and the good drawings of the countryside and sunset.

Although the copy I had (made in 1994) included a dubbing into English, I watched it mostly in Japanese with English subtitles. I tried switching to the English audio track a few times but found the English voices whiney or just plain wrong. I did, however, listen to the two songs (opening and closing credits) in English. These were done well.

Di Yin tells me all Asian children grow up watching this movie (and others by this director in this style). Recently, he's also done Spirited Away and Howl's Moving Castle.