A young witch called Kiki, up to 13 years old, still a little inexperienced, but with a lot of imagination, determination and resourcefulness, with her cat Gigi always standing beside her, she is ready to face the whole world or at least the coastal village European Union, which it has chosen as its new homeland.
A terrific alternative to the diabetic's nightmare that is most of Disney's output, Kiki's Delivery Service takes pride of place in Miyazaki's exceptional body of work.
The film's status as a top-tier animated endeavor is baffling, to say the least, and it's ultimately difficult not to wonder what its ardent followers have embraced so passionately over the years.
The characters are gently and warmly rendered, and a climactic action sequence involving an unmoored dirigible hints at the stately grandiosity of Miyazaki's masterpiece Howl's Moving Castle.
The film becomes a benign guided tour of femininity ... gently broaching universal coming-of-age issues such as independence, insecurity, and even - more boldly than any Western children's movie would contemplate - sexuality.
[Miyazaki] revitalizes conventional tropes, using elegant imagery to say something substantial about growing up, and he even subverts gender stereotypes along the way.
Kiki is at that difficult age where she teeters constantly brazen overconfidence and frustrating self-doubt. It's an age that many parents fear, but it's handled gracefully in Kiki's Delivery Service.
