Name: Hayao Miyazaki | The Mind of a Master
Uploaded: 2025-09-10T13:11:44.000Z
Duration: 28 min 50 s
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Modal verbs - A2

Do you remember the first time you saw a film by Hayao Miyazaki? I do, and I think I was honestly too young to appreciate them. I just thought they were wonderful because I felt like I could escape into their worlds. And also because I was told they were good. But the older I get, the more I realise just how magnificent his animation is. So today I want to try and understand what makes his work so special, and just as equally important, what drives him to continue making them.

To-infinitive

There's been a lot said about Hayao Miyazaki, and really what I want to do with this video is dig as deep as I can, layer by layer, and also to reveal the essential elements of what make his work so unique. And I think we all know that feeling of wonder, just staring at the sheer force of imagination on show in his work.

Future simple

Miyazaki's visual creations are just on a different level. His worlds became more and more populated with interesting creatures and beautiful flights into a dreamer's mind.

Certainly, a deep part of that imagination is rooted in aspects of the Shinto belief that there are spirits everywhere, and that they deserve awe and respect.

This gives him a license to be creative with bizarre but appealing characters. It's important to note that he doesn't actually write a script. He might write an outline, with his plan for a feature, but generally he draws an image and works from there.

He aims to capture your interest with intriguing visuals.

He builds the stories around these visual scenes. Totoro was originally just the image of a girl and Totoro at a bus stop, and the story grew out of that.

It's really important to understand that he allows these visual montages to lead us through his work.

And working in this way allows the animation to grow and change with its development, in a very visual style.

Like any great animator, he can sit and observe the world from a place that interests him, and then he begins filling the world with life.

I think one of the essential elements of the success of Miyazaki's work is that his worlds feel full. Starting with the worlds they're even just set in.

With that, everything in the frame seems to just add to the story.

There's a Japanese word, Funiki, which translates to atmosphere or mood.

It's part of the reason why often these spaces just feel so real, because of the rich atmosphere they strive to create.

Yasuo Otsuka believes that Japanese animation emphasizes this idea of strong emotional resonance rather than just gag-based cartoons, which feeds into the deep worlds and atmospheres developed in Japanese animation.

Bearing that in mind, you can see why it's important to emotionally anchor these stories in a true world.

Eleanor Cameron calls it the particularity of place.

The sense that there is a narrative anchored within a larger world.

And in order to see that, you have to be an excellent observer.

Miyazaki was originally influenced by European architecture and setting, and in a lot of his earlier work you can see that optimistic view of Europe coming through.

But into the 90s and onwards, as he became disillusioned after the collapse of the Soviet

Union, the Japanese elements began to take a more prominent role, as well as the more immediate space that he lives in.

What's interesting as well is that he gives us the space to breathe in the world that he set the story in.

While some deem this technique the pillow shot, a moment of peace between all the action,

Miyazaki refers to it as ma, like a space between a clap.

You take a second to break the tension and allow the film to grow in a deeper dimension.

And as well as the feeling in the world's created, the people that populate them are equally important.

Crowds bustle and every character's movement shows motivation.

He's very particular in background animation, and checks each set of key animation, personally retouching scenes he's not really happy with.

Bear in mind, this is happening while he's doing the storyboards.

He hasn't even finished the story yet, but they're animating in the background.

But he's very good at describing what he wants, and will push people hard to get there.

And underneath that push, there is a fundamental rule that Miyazaki has when it comes to drawing.

Storytelling is about the characters, so they need their vigour to leap off the page.

Here's where the wider depths of Miyazaki kick into gear.

He knows that it's important to understand his characters, and let them grow organically as he draws.

What kind of facial expressions does this girl have?

I can draw each character, so I can understand them bit by bit as I draw.

At the heart of his work are very motivated protagonists.

They inspire action, and are generally not passive at all.

They don't tend to sit around and just run things through their mind over and over again, considering things internally.

No matter what they're faced with, they just get up and go.

And this is where his true mastery shows.

Boiling all that motivation down into how they move.

Although they're both performing the same action, you can see a lot of their character and how they move.

The younger sibling following the older one, repeating what she says, just to be part of the fun.

He pays very close attention to movement, ensuring it goes beyond just a movement, but makes sure it's anchored in a real world observation.

You're not just turning for the sake of turning.

You can tell just by looking at Satsuki, but she doesn't turn that much.

I try to make them do anything, but they don't move.

Even when he was producing only yesterday, not directing, I want to point out, he couldn't stop himself teaching the new recruits about true observation, rather than just assumption.

This kind of thing isn't written as observation.

If you're not achieving the level he wants, he can turn from the kind of Santa Claus vision people have of him, into a very hard taskmaster.

I'm a person who's smiling as much as I can.

Now, these strong characters seem to be projections of what he wished he was, despite all his mistakes.

It roots directly into his childhood, where the community had to face ruin in post-World War II Japan.

But an essence comes through it, concentrating on what remains, rather than what is lost.

And in this sense, the strong female characters that permeate his films are also thought to be a representation of his mother.

A strong, independent woman who developed spinal tuberculosis when Hayao was very young.

These elements shine a light on a deeper motivation in his work.

I want to create something that is reflected in the world.

I really start to understand his push for an incredibly high standard in animation.

The most obvious thing is that I don't want to do anything embarrassing.

I want to create something that's not embarrassing.

When a film is made, the most important thing is not to feel sorry for it.

I don't think about whether I should have done it or not.

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Hayao Miyazaki | The Mind of a Master

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