Has anybody been watching the Studio Ghibli season on Film4? They are a japanese manga movie production company and their films are just beautiful. I've never really been interested in manga at all but after watching David Lynch films I have found that the most important aspect of a film is the unique artistic direction.

I've only seen two of the Studio Ghibli ones, My Neighbour Totoro and Princess Mononoke, of which the latter was my favourite. The messages delivered from the films are brilliant. I love them.

Whoo.

Woohoo! Somebody else who makes the Ghibli/Lynch connection. After watching Spirited Away, i certainly felt a similarity. It's just pure art, and the story/message is so beautiful. I've only seen the aforementioned and Howl's Moving Castle, both of which are unbelieveable.

I can't recommend these films enough, if you get the chance to see them.

Whoo. Kiki's Delivery Service is on today. I'll be watching that.

I'll try and make sure I watch those ones you recommended. :P 

There is a moment in "Spirited Away" when she's riding on the train through the flood water that achieves a crushing melancholy, really remarkable for an animated film. I also recommend "Grave of the Fireflies" dir. by Isao Takahata, colleague of Miyazaki, it's maybe the saddest cartoon ever made.

If you haven't seen it, there's a great featurette on the SA DVD, I think it's in Japanese with English subtitles, but the development of the film is shown, at one point Miyazaki takes his turn preparing a communal pot of noodles for the crew, and there's a meeting where he's describing how the dragon moves and he says "like a snake falling out of a tree", the crew looks bewlidered, "What? None of you has ever seen a snake fall from a tree?!!"

I love Hayao Miyazaki! Grave of the Fireflies is also great, but so depressing you can only watch it once in a while... Miyazaki is often moving but a lot more fun... I can watch his movies over and over again. I've seen all his films except Castle of Cagliostro. Spirited Away is my favorite but Totoro and Kiki are also great, and I think Laputa: Castle in Sky and Howl's Moving Castle are tremendous. His films should definitely be watched in Jap though (except for SA... I actually love that dub). Mononoke never really did it for me somehow though... his films look so beautiful and have great characters... it's rare to see movies so gentle and lush.