Nausicaä of the Valley of Wind (1984)

Cast _*Interesting Facts _*Production Details _*Main Source for this Page: Nausicaa.Net

Original Title: Kaze no Tani no Naushika

Directed by: Hayao Miyazaki
Written by: Hayao Miyazaki
Music by: Joe Hisaishi

Production Period: May 31, 1983 - March 6, 1984
Released on: March 11, 1984 (Japan)
Running Time: 116 minutes

Budget: $
Box-Office: 914,767 admission, ¥742 million in film rental

CAST

Nausicaä... Sumi Shimamoto
Jihl... Mahito Tsujimura
Oh-Baba... Hisako Kyouda
Yupa... Gorou Naya
Mito... Ichirou Nagai
Goru... Kouhei Miyauchi
Gikkuri... Jouji Yanami
Niga... Minoru Yada

STORY

Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind is a film that speaks a great deal about our world. The story takes place sometime in the near future where technology and pollution has virtually destroyed our Earth. Poisonous forests named Fukai (poisonous seas) now cover many parts of the Earth and its domination spread further and further each day. The Valley of the Wind is one of the few places left where peace and nature still exists. The Valley is sheltered from the wars and poison outside because the village is protected by the wind from the sea which prevents the poison from coming in. The people live happily and our Nausicaä is the beloved Princess of this the Valley of the Wind.

Nausicaä dedicates her life to her people and strive to research a cure to help those who suffer from Fukai poison. However, one day, the lives of all those in the Valley are thrown into chaos. The people are in danger of losing all that they have cherished so dearly, and it is up to Nausicaä to save her people and the future of all mankind.

INTERESTING FACTS

Sumi Shimamoto (born in 1954 in Kouchi), the Japanese voice of Nausicaä, is for many Miyazaki fans, the voice of the Miyazaki heroine. She played Clarisse in Lupin III: The Castle of Cagliostro, and Maki in Farewell Beloved Lupin. She also played Satsuki's mother in My Neighbor Totoro.

This movie was banned from Eastern Europe and briefly boycotted in Germany, because enviromentalist organizations were ranting that the film had disturbing scenery of ecological disaster.

The only English version commercially available today is the horrendously mangled "Warriors of the Wind" from New World Video. New World Pictures felt it could only be marketed as a kid's action movie, so they cut out about a quarter of the movie (the parts they felt were "slow moving") and garbled the storyline in the process. Nausicaä was changed to "Princess Zandra". The voice actors and actresses (including the June Foray, voice of "Rocky the flying squirrel") said later that they were never told what the story was about and so the acting was substandard. Miyazaki was horrified when he found out what they had done to his film, and the Ghibli Studio asked everyone to forget that this version ever existed. Fortunately, New World Video's rights to Nausicaä expired in 1995. Disney is going to release the newly dubbed version (uncut), though no official release date was announced yet.

In Japanese, the heroine's name is pronounced [Na u shi ka]. The proper pronunciation for Nausicaä is [Nau-sik'a-e] (the last [e] is supposed to be upside down, pronounced like [a] in ADORE, or [u] in SINUS).

Nausicaä of the Valley of Wind received an award for Best Film at 1985's FantaFestival.

PRODUCTION DETAILS

"The Princess Who Loved Insects" is a story in "Tsutsumi Chunagon Monogatari", which was written at the end of the 12th century. Miyazaki took an inspiration from the princess in this story to create "Nausicaä". This princess was quite eccentric - she didn't dye her teeth black, she didn't shave her eyebrows off, and she was tanned since she actually went outside (this is the equivalent of going around naked today). She loved insects and worms, while other princesses loved butterflies. But she was incredibly intelligent and perceptive. She said "Beauty is only superficial. You have to see the real nature of things to understand them", and loved to watch caterpillars changing into pupas. When her parents tried to persuade her to give up her "hobbies", she replied, "To understand anything, you have to look into it deeply, and see it through from the beginning to the end. This caterpillar will become a butterfly someday. The silks you are wearing came from silkworms, too."

Hayao Miyazaki wondered how this princess survived as an adult, and what her fate had been. We can see the traits of this princess in Nausicaä.

Nausicaä was named after a Phaeacian princess in the Odyssey. Nausicaä was "a beautiful and fanciful girl, quick on her feet... She took delight in nature and had an especially receptive personality". She saved Odysseus when he drifted ashore covered with blood and then nursed his wounds. Another model for Miyazaki's Nausicaä was the "Princess Who Loved Insects". It is an old Japanese story about a noble girl who was regarded as an eccentric because she loved to watch insects.

Nausicaä of the Valley of Wind is based on Miyazaki's manga, "Kaze no Tani no Nausicaä". There are seven volumes in total, and the movie covers about the first two volumes. He started serializing the manga "Nausicaä" in the animation magazine "Animage" in 1982.

At first, Miyazaki did not want to make "Nausicaä" into anime, since he wrote the manga to express something he couldn't express with animation, and since the manga was still at an introductory stage. As a result, the story of the film was substantially changed from the one in the manga.

Miyazaki took 13 years to finish this manga, though he did set the manga aside several times to make movies. A great many things happen after what happened in the movie. Even the part depicted in the movie is much more complicated in the manga.

In the manga, there is a war going on between two superpowers, Torumekia and the Dorok Empire. Nausicaä was a part of Kushana's invading force, which she joined as the chieftain of the valley to keep the old treaty between Torumekia and the valley (so Torumekia was basically an ally, not an enemy). Most of the story then takes place in the land of Dorok. The Doroks are the ones who tried to cause the Ohmu stampede to crush Kushana's army to defend their land from the invasion. Nausicaä didn't even die at this point.

In the manga, there are no simple dichotomies such as valley vs. Torumekia, good vs. evil, or Nature vs. Man. Many characters, such as Kushana, Ghil, and the God Warrior have very different fates and roles than in the movie.

Though some see a religious image in this resurection scene of the anime, Miyazaki himself did not intend it so. In fact, he was hard on himself for giving the movie an ending which looked "religious", and gave only 65 points out of 100 to the movie because of that. Miyazaki had a strong aversion to organized religions. He once said that he did not want to explain the world based on a god. This may be due to his background in Marxism. However, he seems to be "opening up" a bit more towards religion or spirituality these days, largely because writing the manga "Nausicaä" required him to think about philosophical questions such as "What is life?". However, he doesn't belong to any cult or organized religion.