My Neighbor Totoro

How this film uses it

Totoro and the soot sprites are simply part of the world. Nobody explains them and nobody doubts them. The film shows them as plainly and confidently as it shows the farmhouse or the camphor tree.

Where to see it

Satsuki's first encounter with Totoro at the bus stop in the rain, after Mei has already met him. He is just standing there, huge and ordinary.

How this film uses it

The animators draw the rain, the grass and Totoro's fur in such specific detail that you can almost touch them. You can sense how heavy, damp and warm or cold the countryside is.

Where to see it

The rain sequence at the bus stop. Rain falls on the umbrella and on the leaf on Totoro's head. The animators scratched the rain into the cels and layered it over the scene to give it a soft feel.

How this film uses it

The camphor tree is a living shelter, and the forest is as much a subject of the film as the people are. Miyazaki shows nature as conscious and patient, and as closely tied to how well the humans are doing.

Where to see it

The seed-sprouting sequence. Totoro and the girls dance around the planted seeds, and the seeds grow into an enormous tree in a moment of pure joy shared with nature.

How this film uses it

Miyazaki stays on moments of waiting (the bus stop, Mei in the garden). He lets time pass as slowly as it does for a child, which is a lot slower than the squeezed pace of most movies.

Where to see it

The bus stop sequence. Satsuki and Totoro wait together in the rain with very little said.

How this film uses it

The film never looks at events the way an adult would. Totoro is as real as the hospital, and every turn in the story follows what makes emotional sense to the children.

Where to see it

Mei's solo discovery of the small and medium Totoros. The film treats it as a real encounter and takes it as seriously as an excited child would.