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copyright ©1999-2003
DigsMagazine.com.
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Plot synopsis
On
the night of a full moon, thirteen-year-old Kiki decides it’s the
perfect evening for her to embark on her year abroad in a foreign
village, a mandatory requirement for her training as a young witch. Her
parents are nervous, of course; her mom, a fellow witch, is convinced
Kiki hasn’t even learned to fly well enough to take off on her
journey. But Kiki refuses to be swayed: the weather’s perfect and
she’s eager for the adventure. Under the clear moonlight, her friends
and family gather to see her off. Clad in her official witch dress and
with no company save her snarky black cat Jiji, Kiki climbs aboard her
broom – borrowed from her mother, at mom’s insistence – and takes
off on a long, turbulent flight towards parts unknown. Kiki eventually
lands in an elegant, cosmopolitan city by the water, and falls in love
with the sea air and the beautiful buildings, so different from the cozy
little wooded village in which she’s spent her life thus far. It’s
the perfect place for her to work on her witch skills – or so she
thinks at first. She soon finds that most modern city folk feel they
have little use for a fledgling witch. A kindly pregnant baker takes
Kiki in, offering her a room above the bakery in exchange for a little
light help. Slowly, Kiki settles into life in her new home, making
friends with a boy named Tombo, who’s obsessed with building a flying
machine (the fact that Kiki can actually fly without any machine at all
makes her pretty much the perfect girl in Tombo’s eyes). She also
discovers that while her magical powers may not be in high demand by the
community, her flying abilities make her a perfect courier, which is how
Kiki’s delivery service is born.
Review
In
many respects, Kiki’s Delivery Service is a far fluffier movie
than Miyazaki’s better-known (in the U.S. at least) animated features Spirited
Away and Princess
Mononoke. It’s a much more conventional, straight-on kiddie
cartoon: ridiculously cute and sweet-natured to the core, all charming
and light-hearted – 100% child-safe, with absolutely nothing in it
that any parent could possibly object to or interpret as too adult for
kiddie eyes. Even Kiki’s witch powers seem pretty non-witch-like --
sure, she can fly that broom and understand cats, but in every other
way, Kiki’s just a normal girl, with no more connection to any deep,
dark forces in the universe than your average moody teen. But there’s
a lot to like about Kiki even if you’re well beyond the usual
target audience age of animated fare. For one thing, Kiki herself (as
voiced in the English version by the always adorable Kirsten Dunst)
really is adorable, just sassy and occasionally bratty enough to make
her likeably imperfect. The secondary characters are terrific as well,
especially Jiji the cat, who, in his Phil Hartman-voiced English
incarnation, at least, delivers most of the funny in the film with his
deadpan hilarious cynicism. Sharing a starring role in the movie with
Kiki herself is the rich splendor of the gorgeous seaside city where
Kiki takes residence: from the lovely colors of the sky and ocean, to
the sumptuous golden-pink light, to the painstakingly-rendered textures
of the European-styled buildings and streets, the city is so vividly
brought to life on-screen that you feel you ought to be able to book
your next vacation there. Kiki’s Delivery Service may lack the
spiritual depth and layers of meaning that Miyazaki’s newer films
offer to adult viewers, but for fans of exquisite animation, it’s
still well worth a look. —reviewed
by Yee-Fan Sun
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