Witches leave home at thirteen for a year to find a town of their own. Kiki goes on a full moon with her mother’s broom, her father’s radio and her cat Jiji, who talks. She lands in Koriko, a city with trams and a sea, and nobody is impressed by a witch. Osono, who runs a bakery and is pregnant, gives her an attic room in exchange for help, and Kiki realises the one thing she can do is fly. Kiki’s Delivery Service is the Ghibli film about starting a job, and it was Miyazaki’s first commercial hit outside Japan.
What Happens In Koriko
She delivers a toy cat and loses it in a forest, and meets Ursula, a painter who lives alone and becomes the person she needs. A boy named Tombo, who wants to fly, keeps turning up. An old woman asks her to deliver a herring pie to a granddaughter who does not want it. Kiki gets sick, loses the ability to understand Jiji, and then cannot fly at all. The ending is a dirigible loose over the city with Tombo hanging from it, and a borrowed broom.
Why It Is Loved
Koriko is Stockholm and Visby, drawn from Miyazaki’s trip there. The bakery is a real kind of place. Ursula’s speech about why she paints is Miyazaki on why he draws. Jiji’s silence at the end is either sad or correct depending on the viewer. The Disney dub has Kirsten Dunst as Kiki and Phil Hartman as Jiji in his last role.
Watch Kiki’s Delivery Service On GoMovies
103 minutes in HD, Japanese with subtitles. Press play above. Free, no account.