Review of My Neighbors the Yamadas (1999)

Moving picture, 104 minutes

Suzuki Toshio (producer), Takahata Isao (writer-director).

Scenes from the life of an “average” family in modern Japan.

Quiet modernist comedy, similar in concept to Chie the Brat (1981). Disjointed character-based episodes. Ghibli’s first film after the death of Kondō Yoshifumi in 1998. Done on computer in an unusual and interesting style, apparently meant to encapsulate a huge number of references to Japanese culture. Lots of haiku. Based on a strip-format comic.

References here: Ghibli movie titles, “Bonkei: Miniature Garden” (2016).

moving picture Ghibli animation Japanese production fiction