NAUSICAA OF THE VALLEY OF THE WIND

Miyazaki’s second feature emphasises the importance of understanding.

75/100

Original Release: 1984

Directed By: Hayao Miyazaki

Cast: Sumi Shimamoto, Mahito Tsujimura, Hisako Kyoda Favourite Quote:

"There is no reason to live if our lives depend on a monster."

Favourite Shot:

When we see a bug in our bedroom our first instinct is to kill it. Get it out of our sight.

We think it’s dirty. We’re scared of what it’ll do while we’re asleep or while we’re away and we’re scared that it will bring more bugs.

There are clearly all sorts of problems involved and, ultimately, the minimal guilt we feel squashing a bug is far outweighed by the stressful alternative. We act out of fear because we can’t understand it, and it can’t understand us.

If that bug could communicate with us and say: “please don’t kill me”. We would feel much more guilt because we would suddenly understand it better. Or if that bug could understand us, we could easily tell it not to come into our room and then it would be saved.

The characters, the creatures, and even the nature, inside the world of Hayao Miyazaki’s second film, Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind, all act out of fear. The fear of being misunderstood or the fear of misunderstanding others. And it is through this fear that all conflict and pain, in the film (and arguably in life), is created.

The film is set in an apocalyptic future where a war has destroyed civilisation and created a poisonous forest swarming with creepy, giant mutant insects called the Ohmu. The story begins when a ship from another kingdom crash lands in the Valley of the Wind, the home of our hero Nausicaa (Sumi Shimamoto).

The Valley of the Wind is idyllic and peaceful. All the residents are close with each other, but closed off from the rest of the world. The village is drawn in a way that is quiet and wholesome whilst being surrounded by these huge and powerful mountains.

You get the sense that the people of the village would be happy to continue living this way for the rest of time. But this is impossible because, due to the poisonous forest, nothing will grow and the world is slowly dying.

Nausicaa is a young girl who is clearly different from the rest. She is curious, brave and caring. And this is clear from the moment we meet her. A highlight scene reveals that she has been growing her own beautiful garden with clean soil - proving that things can still grow, just not in the soil of the poisonous forest.

The crash landing of the ship exposes the valley to an ongoing war between two opposing kingdoms. Nausicaa is taken as a hostage in a huge ship, but then is almost immediately gunned down.

Miyazaki does a great job with pacing - he will sometimes build something up that seems exactly like something you’ve seen before, only to subvert your expectations and have something unpredictable happen.

And everything happens so quick, you barely get a second to slow down.

When the ship is gunned down Nausicaa falls beneath the surface of the forest and is surprised to find clean water and soil down there. But before she has even enough time to reveal this information to anyone else, elsewhere the war is reaching its climax (like I said, everything moves so quickly).

Miyazaki is known to be a writer who refuses to create an evil character who is purely evil for evil’s sake. And in Nausicaa every character and kingdom involved all have their reasons for doing what they are doing.

But it is all based on this fear of not understanding and being misunderstood. The main villain, Princess Kushana (Yoshiko Sakakibara), is a perfect example of this. As a child she lost one of her arms when she was attacked by an Ohmu.

You can clearly see that below all of her confidence and cruelness, there is fear. Fear of the Ohmu and what they did to her. And this fear stems from her inability to understand and, therefore, control or predict what they will do.

Instead of trying to understand them, which requires much more effort because of the barrier of communication, she chooses the easy option which is to destroy what she can’t understand.

And we see this same attitude from all the characters (except Nausicaa) in regards to the poisonous forest. All are afraid of it and instead of attempting to investigate it and learn about what it is doing - they become violent because of it.

Nausicaa is the only one with the patience and empathetic abilities to try and understand both the ohmu and the forest. And with this she realises a beauty inside both of them.

Miyazaki does this in a way also with the Princess Kushana character. We, as an audience, are used to villains being evil, and as a result we feel a sense of dislike for them. And it is easy for us to dislike a villain.

But instead of just presenting a simple villainous character Miyazaki forces the audience to understand her and find the beauty inside her and it is quite rewarding in the end.

The final battle is breathtaking. The image of the tortured baby Ohmu and the army of Ohmu coming for it, is truly uncomfortable and heart wrenching. And Nausicaa’s death is emotionally devastating.

And then there is the beautiful ending sequence where Nausicaa is revived. The Ohmu and her share a memory from when she was a young girl while a haunting melody plays. And this is what eventually binds them together.

Perhaps Miyazaki is advancing the notion that the best way we can connect and understand each other is through stories. And it is through these stories that we can escape fear and pain.