Saturday, July 10, 2010

Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind


Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind was made before Studio Ghibli existed but is often included in their list of works, and is really the beginning of the studio. I watched a pretty decent dubbed version with voices from the likes of Alison Lohman and Uma Thurman. Alison's voice is really perfect for the main characters voice; the princess of the valley known as Nausicaa.


The movie was made in 1984, and the music is very 80's; sounding somewhere between a sleazy porn movie and an 8-bit video game. The movie looks very surreal, being set in a post-apocalyptic world where most of the planet is covered by a toxic jungle. Humans cannot enter the jungle without masks to prevent them being poisoned by spores. It is filled with dangerous creatures, including giant Ohm's, which are huge caterpillar like things, covered in eyes which glow red with fury when they are provoked.


Nausicaa is a princess loved by her people; who is able to communicate with and calm the creatures of the jungle, as well as people. She's a genuine hero, she flies a jet glider skillfully, she always does the right thing, she's an environmentalist and animal lover. Needless to say when her world is threatened, we feel bad for her and want to save it.


It's definitely one of the best SG movies so far, and my son who is 8 loved it too; one that we will watch again and again.


4 comments:

Unknown said...

Nausicaa is actually one of my least favourite Ghibli movies, with probably only Howl's behind it. You've already watched one of my favourites (Whisper of the Heart) but have lots more of them to come (Only Yesterday, Porco Rosso, Spirited Away, Kiki's Delivery Service are all amazing).

Also I totally understand watching the dubbed versions with the kids, but do yourself a favour and watch the subbed version sometime. The original voices are so good and sometimes the English version changes a character's whole personality (the worst offender to me being Jiji the cat in Kiki's).

Unknown said...

Oh, and I can't believe I didn't mention Totoro, which is my absolute favourite Ghibli movie and one of my favourite films overall!

Justin said...

Hi Dave thanks for the comments. I love Totoro too; the characters are so cute and brilliantly animated.

A.K. said...

Get a room