Lukie's Top 16 Studio Ghibli Films

[LUKIE]

05. Howl's Moving Castle

The animation and the visuals of the walking castle alone, make this film amazing. Once again, the characters are very memorable, from the main character Sophie, to Howl himself, his young apprentice boy, Markl, and the evil Witch of the Waste. My favourite character in the entire film is Heen the Dog! Heen is awesome. A war is waging between two states, for no reason at all really. All of the witches and wizards have been called into service, including Howl. A senseless war with senseless violence, and it is brought to everyones attention numerous times that there are horrific casualties on each side. Amazing visuals from the backgrounds, to the war in the sky, and the castle itself. There is no slow point in the film, with so much to take in at every single time.

[LUKIE]

04. Ponyo (on the Cliff)

I will argue that Ponyo is the best animated film from Ghibli to date. The ocean scene of Ponyo running on the waves is an incredible work of pure animation, and possibly the greatest piece of animation ever released. Ponyo is a love story about a 5 year old boy, and a part human/part sea spirit girl named Ponyo. It is the purest love story you could ever think of, since it involves children. Hell, at the end of the movie, they are blessed to be together for eternity, basically.

There are so many memorable characters, but most memorable is Fujimoto, Ponyo's father. He is an incredible character, and, to use a wrestling term, as much of a tweener as you can get. Deep down you know he is not a bad man, but his circumstances leave him doing things we deem to be bad. Ponyo deserves so many accolades for being an incredible movie, and to be honest, I questioned whether this should have been as high as number 2 on my list.

[stokeriño]

So the top three include Kiki, Laputa and Porco Rosso?

Difficult to rank those. My preference would change with my mood. All good choices though.

[LUKIE]

And I never finished this. So top three:

3. Laputa

2. Kiki's

1. Porco Rosso

[Benjamin]

You put Earthsea above Grave of the Fireflies Walk into the ocean, and just keep on walking.

Really great list actually, sad Nausicaa isn't on here, and Castle in the Sky too! I need to see more of them (only seen like 9 or 10), but I most probably need to see your top 3, right? I wanna' just Mononoke now, though. And I agree, Nausicaa is like an older, less prettier sister film to Princess Mononoke.

I love you for loving Howl's Moving Castle, though. Not a lot of people rank that highly, but I love it, like Mononoke it's so imaginative and out there and crazy it's just so wonderful.

[stokeriño]

Really great list actually, sad Nausicaa isn't on here, and Castle in the Sky too!

Castle in the Sky = Laputa.

[Avenged Probably]

It looks like most if not all of them have had blu ray releases by now! This is a perfect reason to work my way through the lot. There's not a one I've seen and wouldn't watch again... and by the looks of it there are many great ones I haven't seen.

[Benjamin]

Really great list actually, sad Nausicaa isn't on here, and Castle in the Sky too!

Castle in the Sky = Laputa.

Huh? Did I make some grammar mistake there? I know Nausicaa is the girl in Valley of the Wind and Laputa is Castle in the Sky

[stokeriño]

Really great list actually, sad Nausicaa isn't on here, and Castle in the Sky too!

Castle in the Sky = Laputa.

Huh? Did I make some grammar mistake there? I know Nausicaa is the girl in Valley of the Wind and Laputa is Castle in the Sky

Oh. I read that as "sad that neither Nausicaa nor Castle in the Sky are on the list"...

[cthemason]

Thanks for sharing (bumping) this. I was especially intrigued because I never really got through your top two favorite films. I saw most of these during an epic Miyazaki marathon TCM ran back in like 2006. Watching Spirited Away immediately followed by Princess Mononoke for the first time, on the first night of the marathon, was life changing. It was just something I randomly stumbled upon channel surfing at that.

I think I had become visually overstimulated in the midst of it that and did not finish Kiki's or Porco Rosso. I was very sleep deprived in school that week. So like I said, thanks for sharing. I'm looking forward to laying some fresh eyes on those and likely loving the hell out of them.

Edited August 6, 2014 by cthemason