Kiki's Delivery Service -- The Sweets And Bitters of Growing Up

     Before starting, you can click the following link to enjoy the songs I like from Kiki’s Delivery Service with this post.

やさしさに包まれたなら=If surrounded by kindness

ルージュの伝言=LipstickMessage

     Today I am going to talk about Kiki’s Delivery Service. Kiki’s Delivery Service can be said to be the second Ghibli movie I have watched for the most times(the first one is Howl’s Moving Castle since Howl is so charming lol) because of the thought-provoking plot about getting mature and independent, and the beautiful songs in the movie.

     Also, Kiki’s black cat, Jiji is my favorite mascot among all the mascots appearing in Ghbli movies like Totoro or Noh-face! It is super adorable!

(“Kiki! Look! Look!”)

Movie Information

Kiki’s Delivery Service (魔女の宅急便)

Production company: Studio Ghibli

Directed by: Miyazaki Hayao (宮崎駿)

Written by: Miyazaki Hayao (宮崎駿)

Music by: Hisaishi Joe (久石讓)

Release dates: 1989/07/29

Running time: 102 minutes

Country: Japan

Language: Japanese

(Information from Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kiki%27s_Delivery_Service)

Plot

     Every witch has to leave her hometown and live in an unfamiliar city for an year as a training to become a real witch at the age of thirteen. Kiki, the protagonist of the movie, is going to leave her home and begin her new life, learning to be mature. The movie is about her experience facing all the unknown people and things in a new city, growing up as a witch with strong power of heart.

Review(Warning: The following part contains spoiler)

     I think this movie represents everyone’s growing progress since we are all like Kiki, leaving hometown to learn to be mature and take care of ourselves.

     We must feel nervous while stepping out from our comfort zone and going to a new environment. “Will they like me? Do I look weird to them?”must be questions that we ask hundreds of times to ourselves. Just like how Kiki feels when she first arrives the city. She causes a traffic accident and is laughed by some girls because of her appearance. Therefore, she thinks nobody will like or accept her.

(“She looks so dumb!”)

     Then we meet our benefactors in our lives, in Kiki’s case, Osono, the owner of a bakery. Kiki not only gets a free place to live from her but also realizes what she can do for a living in the city – delivering things by flying.

(Kiki’s first delivery is to help Osono return the forgotten pacifier from a mother.)

     After having a real job, meeting customers that appreciate her, Kiki gradually finds the sense of belonging and acceptance in the city. She also meets a guy named Tombo, who always wants to fly in the sky and becomes friends with him. Just like us who start to find our own positions in the new environment.

     However, life is full of ups and downs. In the progress of growing up, there must be things going differently from our expectation. Seeing Tombo chatting happily with the mean girls that laughs at her appearance, Kiki feels bad (maybe out of jealousy) and loses her faith to herself, which leads to the loss of her magic power, making her not able to talk to Jiji and to fly.

     Never be afraid of failures in life since they happen naturally. We just have to bestir ourselves and remember the lesson after that. After talking to her friend and an old lady who once gets a massive help from Kiki, she finally finds confidence and faith to herself, regaining the power of flying and saving Tombo from an accident by flying with a brush.

(“Everyone has a characteristic that is born with him or her.”)

     The whole movie focuses on the mental growth of a girl, the thing we have to maintain no matter what happens(Faith), and things we have to sacrifice with growth.(For example, Kiki can never “talk” to Jiji again even though she regains her power because she has grown up and cannot depend on Jiji so much anymore.)

     Just like Kiki, I am studying in an unfamiliar city right now. The movie vividly shows the excitement and intenseness I have while my first days as an university students in a way that can be accepted by both children and adults. Although I am gradually used to my life in this city now, things might still go wrong some day. But I believe if I stay faithful to myself like Kiki, things will work out eventually.

Trivia

     We all know that Studio Ghibli loves to put easter eggs in the movies.

The bus that causes the accident when Kiki arrives the city says “Studio Ghibli!” It appears for about only a second and is really hard to discover!

     Do you know that Kiki’s Delivery Service is actually based on a novel with the same name written by Kadono Eiko? The animated movie version from Ghibli only involves a small part of the novel. In the end of the novel series, Kiki gets married with Tombo and gives birth to a pair of twins!

(The cover of the first volume of Kiki’s Delivery Service)

     There is also a movie version of Kiki’s Delivery, which is released in 2014!

(Movie poster of Kiki’s Delivery)

     See ya!