My Neighbor Totoro

[osprey_archer]

I love My Neighbor Totoro. I love it I love it I love it so much that I have nothing coherent to say about it and must instead list all the things that I love.

I love Totoro and the soot sprites and this magical world that lives alongside the mundane - neither creepy nor sappy, but uncanny.

I love Satsuke and Mei's father, kind and zany and always there; and I love their mother, who gets little screen time but becomes a palpable presense anyway - and as an individual, this mother, not just a generic missing mother figure.

I love Kanta, so shy he lends Satsukea and Mei his umbrella and runs off into the rain without speaking. I love that he and Satsuke become friends - real friends, not boyfriend and girlfriend to be.

And most of all, I love Mei and Satsuke. Four-year-old Mei, adorable and funny and sometimes so sad - some days there's nothing in the world as hard as being four. Her old sister Satsuke, mature but still very much a child: lively and imaginative, easily embarrassed and easily affectionate. I love their love for each other: the strength of the bond around which the warmth of the movie wraps.

So much love!

Comments

[asakiyume.livejournal.com]

Here is one, from November 1991--the TV is what they're looking at:

(http://www.flickr.com/photos/86761435@N00/4911224757/)

And here's a more detailed one, from just after Christmas 1991

(http://www.flickr.com/photos/86761435@N00/4911226473/)

[osprey-archer.livejournal.com]

So cute!