Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind

The magical Miyazaki knew how to captivate and move the audience from the very beginning. The theme of "boy and girl saving the world" still has plenty to be said, but adventurous ecological motifs, later expanded in Laputa or in Princess Mononoke, were already at work here. The only stumbling block is the overly drawn-out passage about the open war, but the rest pulled me into the irresistible world of Ohms, the Wasteland, and beautiful underground caves. (24/08/2007)

A post-apocalyptic ecological fantasy where medievally dressed people race around in planes that resemble WWII bombers and fight giant insects? I guess no combination is impossible when put together by a true visionary, which Hayao Miyazaki clearly is. The film won me over in the first fifteen minutes and held me tight until the end. (02/07/2023)

I appreciate the ecological subtext, which, given the time of the film's creation, seems almost visionary. Apart from the engaging animation, I really liked the accompanying music, but for my taste, too much space was given to the turmoil of war. I'd rather spend more time enjoying Princess Nausicaä's mysterious expeditions into a strange post-apocalyptic world. (65%) (08/04/2021)

Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind was the first in a series of blockbusters that made Miyazaki internationally famous, but coincidentally, I came across it as the last one - when I had already thoroughly understood his work, artistic style, and narrative technique, so he couldn't surprise me with anything. It is definitely a grandly constructed image of an alternative world, and one can admire the director's imagination, but at the same time, it lacks greater character plasticity and a more developed thought world because these simplified eco-activist ideas seem to have come straight from Greenpeace, including the mythology of "Goddess Gaia." From an artistic standpoint, Miyazaki repeats himself and, similar to Disney once upon a time, actually creates a kind of template for his characters. I couldn't identify with the characters precisely because they were so flat. At this stage of his creation, Miyazaki still boxed his characters into prominent heroes and despicable villains according to the black-and-white vision of B-movies. This simple morality just doesn't work for me. Overall impression: 55%. (20/11/2011)

Miyazaki's imagination and enormous sense of grandeur is already evident in Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind, the animation is as elaborate as it can be, and the number of strange creatures knows no bounds. At the forefront of it all is the brave Nausicaä, who masters (not only) so many martial arts that even Chuck Norris could envy her. The plot itself is well executed, but I had trouble thinking deeply about its meaning - too bad. Either way, this is a very promising early work from one of my favorite directors. (02/06/2011)