Consider the way the children first approach the house. It has a pillar on its porch that is almost rotted through, and they gingerly push it a little, back and forth, showing how precariously it holds up the roof. But it does hold up the roof, and we avoid the American cliche of a loud and sensational collapse, with everyone scurrying to safety.
When they peek into the house and explore the attic, it's with a certain scariness--but they disperse it by throwing open windows and waving to their father from the upper floor. And consider that the father calmly accepts their report of mysterious creatures. Do sprites and totoros exist? They certainly do in the minds of the girls.
So do other wonderful creatures, such as the Cat Bus, which scurries through the forest on eight quick paws, its big eyes working as headlights. This becomes clear in the lovely extended sequences involving totoros--which are not mythological Japanese forest creatures, but were actually invented by Miyazaki just for this movie.
Little Mei finds the first baby totoro, which looks like a bunny, scurrying around their yard, and follows it into the forest. Her father, home alone and absorbed in his work, doesn't notice her absence.
The baby leads her down a leafy green tunnel and then there's a soft landing on the stomach of a vast slumbering creature. Miyazaki doesn't exploit cliches about the dark and fearsome forest; when Setsuki and her father go looking for Mei, they find her without much trouble--sleeping on the ground, for the totoro has disappeared.
Later, the girls go to meet their father's bus. But the hour grows late and the woods grow dark. Silently, casually, the giant totoro joins them at the bus stop, standing protectively to one side like an imaginary friend.
It begins to rain. The girls have umbrellas, and give one to the totoro, who is delighted by the raindrops on the umbrella, and jumps up and down to shake loose a cascade of drops from the trees. Then the bus arrives. However, its post-war setting, [15] sober subject matter and minute length led to its rejection during a planning meeting.
Financiers and distributors did not believe the story of two little girls and a monster in modern Japan. But producer Toshio Suzuki is convinced of the allure of seeing Totoro animated on the big screen.
He shrewdly proposed a simultaneous release of Totoro and Takahata's Grave of the Fireflies ; however the proposal was also rejected. They knew that if a film is adapted from one of their novels, schools would be forced to see it for educational purposes.
Then, this same audience would then be able to attend the screening of a second film, included in the price of the ticket. The very young Studio Ghibli , then two-years old, thus found himself managing and producing two films with seemingly no real commercial appeal at the same time, over a record period of only one year.
Two possibilities are then considered: turning over two films six month periods or dividing the studio in two and making the films jointly. The first possibility raises the question of whether the team will be able to direct Takahata's film and then immediately shift to Miyazaki's while managing the staff's energy and enthusiasm. In the end, the second solution was chosen and almost every animator who collaborated on Castle in the Sky , went on to work on My Neighbor Totoro.
While Takahata's production crew moved into Studio 1 i. The area was designated as Studio 2 , created especially for Miyazaki's production needs. In practice, the conversion of the second studio only began on April 1, , thus requiring staff to temporarily cohabit with the team of Studio 1.
The three men do not know each other very well. Only Oga had previously collaborated with Miyazaki on Panda! Joe Hisaishi was hired once again to craft the film's score.
The director challenged Oga to raise his standards. The ultimate product was described by Studio Ghibli producer Toshio Suzuki: "It was nature painted with translucent colors. The move into Studio 2 finally took place on April 13, , and came with a small inauguration ceremony. On April 14, Miyazaki completed his directing proposal the content would turn out differently to the final movie in one day.
The next day, he began working on the film's synopsis, a process that lasts eight days. On April 16, he met with Rieko Nakagawa , author of children's books, and asked her to write the lyrics for the opening credits song of the film, Sanpo Promenade.
That same day, he asked Joe Hisaishi to begin composing music for the film. Hayao Miyazaki has a strong admiration for children's author Reiko Nakagawa's work, and begged her to write the opening song to Totoro. On April 18, a joint press conference on the two films took place at the Diamond Hotel in Tokyo, officially announcing their proposed release date.
Nearly two hundred journalists were in attendance. Some have noted it was the 'most important' press conference for animated films at the time. On April 28, Miyazaki began work on Totoro's storyboard. The film was initially to be split into three 30 minutes parts. Each part would begin with a three-minute introduction, bringing the film to a total runtime of 77 minutes. By the end of May, the first drafts of parts A and B were completed.
This was around the time when Miyazaki changed the cut of the film to include part D. At the beginning of June , the timing of part A was completed shots for 1, Also in June , Miyazaki announces in an interview that a quarter of production had already been completed.
He gives a fairly detailed description of the Totoros and the Catbus and refers to the Totoros as "spirits of nature". The Catbus was used in the poster for a special exhibit at the Ghibli Museum. From July 11 and the days that follow, Miyazaki lays out his expectations, important points and feelings to the key facilitators of parts A and B.
In the middle of summer, the storyboard of part C was finished shots for 1, seconds. However, the daily progression hoped for by producer Toru Hara was not achieved. To keep a high level of quality throughout the film, he decided to call on other subcontracting studios for the key drawings and other miscellaneous details. Despite the rapid progress of labor, this period proved to be the most challenging. It is for this reason that at the beginning of the fall, the team of Studio 2 left a day for a picnic of "motivation" in the valley of Akikawa.
The studio organized this getaway during the week, without warning the subcontracted studios which, for their part, continued their work. The opening sequence of the film was not storyboarded, Miyazaki said.
Each element was made individually and combined in the time sheets I believe he lives on acorns. He's supposedly the forest keeper, but that's only a half-baked idea, a rough approximation.
The storyboard depicts the town of Matsuko as the setting, with the year being ; Miyazaki stated that it was not exact and the team worked on a setting "in the recent past". At the beginning of October , the first version of the film was screened. Despite the absence of sound and the disorder of the sequences, those who viewed it were satisfied with the result of their work. At the end of the month, Shiba arrived with the test tapes of the actors selected to lend their voices to the characters.
The vocal liners of Satsuki , Mei , Mr. Kusakabe were chosen by the end of this meeting. Towards the end of , the storyboard for part D was completed shots for 1, seconds. With the e-konte storyboards completed, Miyazaki could finally concentrate on checking the key drawings of the animation. Yasuyoshi Tokuma , president of the Tokuma group , visited Studio 2 at the end of the year to encourage the team. On December 30, Studio 2 celebrated their last working day of the year at an Iseya restaurant, near Inokashira Park.
Most of the team members then went back home to celebrate the New Year. However, workaholics still spent the New Years working. A few went to the local temple to meditate and wish each other happiness and luck. They are sixteen in total, including the animators from Studio 1. Several collected editions of e-konte storyboards Totoro have been released in time. Work resumed on January 4, Studio 2 was on their last stage of intervals. By mid-January, all that remained to be done were the key drawings of part D.
At the end of the month, more and more key animators handed in their work and joined the team of animators. They contributed to the last push of the interval. On February 21, the key drawings for the opening credits were completed. It was this sense of competition that split his original single character and gave birth to the sisters: Satsuki and Mei. The poster went through several revisions and at the end, Miyazaki had reverted to his original character from the picturebook.
So there were never any inquiries about the girl in the poster and the studio never had any impetus to change it. April 19, at am. April 28, at pm. May 2, at pm. Kusakabe Family. Tatsuo Yasuko Satsuki Mei. Sayama Hills Residents. Totoros and Other Animals. Animated features. Feature films. Short films. Television series.
Video games. Printed works. Pre-Ghibli works. Ghibli-related labels. Unproduced projects.
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