Kiki’s Delivery Service

When a witch turns thirteen, she must leave home for a year of training, so young Kiki takes off with her mother’s broom, her father’s radio, and her own black cat, the sardonic Jiji. Unskilled in sorcery, she supports herself as best she can, delivering parcels by broom. Kiki’s journey takes place in a gorgeously realized alternate Europe, where quaint cobbled streets teem with 1930s-style cars and dirigible voyages appear on live television. Beguiling us into this familiar but strange world, Hayao Miyazaki intersperses episodes of exhilarating adventure with more contemplative moments than most contemporary kids’ films allow. Soaring flight scenes eloquently express the expansive sensations of newfound independence. With help from women of several generations—a kindly baker, a grandmotherly customer, a free-spirited young painter—Kiki grapples with the same insecurities that trouble all adolescents and learns that even when the magic of childhood fades, there are new enchantments to discover.