My Neighbor Totoro

Voices of: Hitoshi Takagi, Sumi Shimamoto, Dakota Fanning, Elle Fanning, Tim Daly, Pat Carroll, Frank Welker, David Midthunder
Directed by: Hayao Miyazaki
Rating: G
Genre: Animation, Comedy, Drama
1988

Times Seen:
Tim: 1

Summary: Two girls move to the country with their father and interact with the spirits of the forest that surround them.

Review:

Tim: Hayao Miyazaki delivers another emotional, memorable film with My Neighbor Totoro. While I liked the movie, it felt like a slightly lesser effort than some of his other films. It's always a good movie, but it never quite makes the level of impact I'd expected. The story feels small, too narrowly focused at times. Still, Miyazaki is doing things few are capable of doing, so this movie mostly deserves our praise.

I felt like the scope of the story was both a positive and a negative for this film. On the positive side, this is a very character-driven story. It's really about two girls, their father, and their hospital-bound mother. They move to the country and we follow their life for a little while. They do meet spirits of the forest, Totoro the most memorable. Not a lot happens in the film- the big climax involves the younger girl getting lost and the people of the village trying to find her. It's hard to describe, but everything just feels so small stakes here. The big climax tries to ramp up the intensity a bit, but it's all fairly predictable and it never quite achieves that goal. So, the positive is that this movie isn't about saving the world, it's really focused on the characters and building them out to a place of depth. On the other hand, though, I wish something a bit more substantial happened in this film. As is, the movie ends and I felt, "Hm, that's it?"

The animation is impressive, especially the character design. Totoro is a memorable character from the visual perspective (he never really does too much that's actually interesting). The highlight of the film has to be the same image on the cover (except both girls are in the shot in the film)- you have the older sister holding the younger sister on her back, under an umbrella, while the larger-than-life Totoro stands next to them, all in the rain and waiting at a bus stop. It's such an unexpected, memorable, unique view. That's one of the big strengths of the film- it looks beautiful and it delivers visuals that have never been crafted before- Miyazaki absolutely had a unique, original vision for this film. It's certainly hard to compare this film to anything else. It does feel like it stands alone. The movie has great music, sweeping and beautiful- the shots of the bucolic life these characters live is gorgeous and memorable, too. I read that aspects of this film were autobiographical, which makes sense, because Miyazaki approaches the location and the characters with love and longing.

I did watch the later version, dubbed in English. I liked hearing Dakota and Elle Fanning, and Tim Daly did a nice job as well. Part of me wished I'd watched it in Japanese, but I was watching with my kids and I wanted them to enjoy the film. I believe they did- my son is 9 (nearly 10), and my daughter nearly 6.5. My son really enjoyed the film, and when I asked my daughter just now, she replied, "I guess." She watched it, focused the entire time, but she does tend to be less effusive in her praise. The movie is only 1 hour, 26 minutes, so it's one we watched straight through. It could have actually been a bit longer, I did feel a slight amount of surprise when the credits rolled.

I did enjoy My Neighbor Totoro. I don't think the film is as memorable or impactful as Howl's Moving Castle, Spirited Away, or especially Princess Mononoke, but if this might be a slightly "lesser" effort from Miyzaki and Studio Ghibli (and yes, I recognize many, many people will disagree with my assessment), it's still wild how good the film is. I liked the movie and I do think it's another success from the studio and director.

Rating 1-10
Tim's Rating- 7



If You Enjoyed This Movie, We Recommend: Spirited Away, Princess Mononoke, Howl's Moving Castle, Castle in the Sky