Miyazaki so effectively captures the feeling of a child’s life, inside as well as out, that little ones are often mesmerized by the movie, and adults are returned to a time when they could enjoy mystery for its own sake.

Here is a children's film made for the world we should live in, rather than the one we occupy. A film with no villains. No fight scenes. No evil adults. No fighting between the two kids. No scary monsters. No darkness before the dawn. A world that is benign. A world where if you meet a strange towering creature in the forest, you curl up on its tummy and have a nap.

An otherworldly tale of childhood and a definitive work of imagination.

Hayao Miyazaki's family fantasy is full of benign spirituality, prelapsarian innocence, but little icky sentiment.

An animated achievement almost without parallel.