The ‘Hayao Miyazaki - Movies’ Facebook page has a jaw-dropping 520k followers. Its popularity is a testament to the quality of Studio Ghibli’s movies, people’s love of Miyazaki’s animations, as well as the Facebook page team’s efforts to promote the community through gorgeous pictures, as well as funny and relatable memes.
Be warned though—after you’re done enjoying this list, you’re probably going to want to binge-watch everything from My Neighbor Totoro to Spirited Away. Although that sounds like a thoroughly awesome idea. We may need to reschedule our plans for the next week…
Miyazaki, now 82, was born in Bunkyo, Tokyo, Japan, in 1941. He started his decades-spanning and illustrious career in 1963 when he joined Toei Animation. The filmmaker had shown an interest in manga and animation from a very early age. He directed his first feature film, Lupin III: The Castle of Cagliostro, in 1979.
It was after the success of Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind, released in 1984, that Miyazaki co-founded Studio Ghibli together with Isao Takahata. Widely known and adored in Japan at the time, the filmmaker began making waves in the West with the release of Princess Mononoke in 1997.
The filmmaker cemented his reputation in the West with Spirited Away in 2001 which won Picture of the Year at the Japanese Academy Awards. It was also the first anime movie to win an American Academy Award. Some of the recurring themes that Miyazaki analyzes in his films include humankind’s relationship with nature and technology.
There’s a shroud of mystery surrounding Miyazaki’s latest animated feature film, How Do You Live?, which has had barely any marketing done for it. The aim is to have fans of the filmmaker’s work experience the movie without having any other preconceptions. According to The Hollywood Reporter, it is the first Studio Ghibli film to get a simultaneous Imax release.
Miyazaki claims that How Do You Live? will be his last feature film. However, if you’re getting a sudden sense of déjà vu, you’re not alone in this. The legendary filmmaker made a similar claim a decade ago, when he released The Wind Rises in 2013. He came out of retirement in 2016 to work on How Do You Live?
“Deep down, I think this is what moviegoers latently desire,” Studio Ghibli’s lead producer Toshio Suzuki, widely known as Miyazaki’s right-hand, said about the newest feature’s lack of promotional material. Nearly everything is kept under wraps about the “grand fantasy” project.
