Studio Ghibli Thoughts: Kiki's Delivery Service

 

Looking back at Studio Ghibli's history, you may be surprised to learn that their first commercial success wasn't with My Neighbor Totoro (although Totoro's merchandise would eventually become the pillar of the studio's fortunes) but with Hayao Miyazaki's film after it; Kiki's Delivery Service. It is with this movie that Studio Ghibli's commercial reception caught up to their critical pedigree, and that continued with most of their movies since. It makes sense then that Kiki's Delivery Service, more so than any other film before it, encompasses Miyazaki's style and ethos.

The movie follows the story of 13-year-old witch Kiki in her coming-of-age ceremony, in which she needs to travel and live in a different city as its resident "witch". We see the initial excitement as she leaves her home behind, accompanied by her talking black cat, Jiji, and then the initial notes of hesitation when she arrives in her new chosen town.

Miyazaki is not shy about the message in his movies to youth. He showcases the values of hard work, labor, perseverance, and the pursuit of a worthwhile endeavor regardless of the result. Kiki is Miyazaki's first heroine that goes through the gamut of growing up on-screen, and she is helped in that by a cast of characters that support her in both action and example, but without babying her. For example, the bakery owner Osono allows her to live in the bakery's attic, but she asks that Kiki helps in the bakery as compensation.

From that point, the movie could have been a straightforward romp as Kiki starts her flying delivery service and has the occasional adventure, but the movie is better than that because it goes into deeper places. Like any person, especially someone growing up, Kiki has her own insecurities and worries that she faces, and the way they manifest on screen and she deals with them makes her a hugely believable character.

Ultimately, this is a movie about growing up with all the joys and pains accompanying that process. Kiki is a good, but not perfect person, and that makes her journey easier to empathize with. It is a beautiful film with great characters and a strong theme that is perfectly paced from beginning to end and therefore earns a Top-Tier placement in the Studio Ghibli canon.

As an aside, there is one curious difference between the original Japanese version of the movie and its first official English dub (I am not sure if this difference is there in the updated dub) that I think showcases the difference in maturity and sensibility between Studio Ghibli and the Disneyfied children animation for the west. At the height of her crisis in confidence, as she grows up, Kiki loses the ability to talk to her cat, which devastated her. That moment expresses the pain and uncertainty of growing up. Later, we see Kiki accepting her growth and self with all the difficulties associated with it, and despite still being friends with Jiji she never regains the ability to speakto him. However, in the finale of the original English version, they dub in a few words to suggest that Kiki did regain that skill, thereby cheapening the message of the film which does not shirk itself from pain.