The age of thirteen is an important one in the life of an apprentice witch, because it means she’s ready to take the next step in her training... She must say goodbye to her family, strike out on her own, and find a way to use her magic to support herself for one year before she can return home a full fledged witch. This assignment can leave many apprentice witches feeling nervous, but for Kiki, she can’t strike out on her own fast enough. Eager to prove herself in the big city, she takes up residence in the attic of a bakery, and opens her own delivery service, using her developing proficiency for flying to transport goods between customers, marvelling at the wonders around her, and meeting all sorts of exciting new people! However, as the reality of the working world begins to set in, and she faces complication after complication while struggling to bring in more work for herself, the magic of her situation soon fades, leaving her wondering if the choices she made for herself were really the right ones. Will Kiki be able to turn things around, or is this once peppy young witch destined for failure?

I shouldn’t even have to say this, especially since we’re talking about a Studio Ghibli movie, but the visuals in this film are absolutely immaculate. I wouldn’t go as far as to say every movie that’s ever come out of this studio has been perfect in that regard, but even their worst projects never looked cheap, although your feelings on the visual style of each title may differ. Kiki’s Delivery Service, as far as I can tell, looks flawless. Character movement is graceful and lively, and there are no frozen extras in the background, making every location in the story feel alive and organic. Speaking of locations, the big town that Kiki settled in was apparently based on a similar seaside community in Switzerland, and the level of detail that went into every single individual building and even occasionally into their interiors are kind of awe inspiring. The town feels warm and welcome, and in some spots, you can just feel the pleasant sea breeze blowing through the air.

This little extra attention to detail can show in some easy to miss spots... Take, for example, the fact that when you look at Tombo’s bike, you can clearly see that he diverted the chain that previously connected between the gears of his tires to the propeller, so when he pumps his legs he actually is making it spin, which is the real force that’s moving them forward. What’s way more noticeable, and for all the right reasons, is the flying animation, which may actually be some of the best isolated animation work that Miyazaki has ever done. From the way the flaps of Kiki’s dress flap with the wind moving through them, to the biological details of geese soaring in formation, to the perfectly captured weight of Kiki’s broom as she sometimes perfectly controls it, and sometimes struggles to KEEP control of it. There are flying scenes throughout the movie that you get to enjoy, and there’s nothing repetitive about them, as she bounces between trees, soars freely through the atmosphere, and dodged and weaves between live traffic on the street, it’s not just fun to watch, but it feels like it was also fun to animate.

The character designs are also extremely easy on the eyes, melding cartoony anime faces with realistic body proportions, and while I’ve said similar things about anime in the past, the juxtaposition here honestly feels a lot smoother and more consistent than other Ghibli titles that I’ve seen. Their faces, especially Kiki’s, are expressive and can convey a wide range of emotion with minimal changes. It’s important to note that like most Ghibli movies, there’s an element of “growing up” in this story, and while the time period it covers is too brief for Kiki to go through any real physical changes, you can still see a noticeable amount of growth in her face, as she matures from a bright eyed and excitable young kid to a young adult with a more mature understanding of the world around her. It’s also just as important, albeit more subtle, that while the town she’s working in is a visual wonder, it still feels both rustic and realistic enough that while Kiki matures, you can feel her gradually adapting to her slightly more dreary surroundings.

As for the English dub... Well, there are three of them, and while the Streamline dub is rare enough that you’re probably never going to have a chance to watch it in your lifetime, there are two widely available versions of the Disney dub, and despite being mostly the same, they still offer largely different experiences. Before we get into those differences, though, what do they have in common? First, Kirsten Dunst is an absolute joy as Kiki. Out of all the mainstream Hollywood starlets who have headlined a Ghibli dub, she’s easily one of the best of them, arguably the best over-all out of the child stars. This is partially due to her having a decent amount of prior acting experience, but I don’t think there’s any other quantifier for it, she just pulls off an outstanding performance. She’s bright, says her lines loudly and clearly with perfect diction, and she keeps a pitch perfect sense of tone between Kiki’s cheerful and sincere beginnings, her indignation over Tombo, and her ennui later in the film.

The rest of the cast capably fill out the roles... Janeane Garofalo plays a role pretty much any actress could have taken, but she still makes it her own. There are a couple of career voice actors peppered in with all of the big Hollywood names, such as Jeff Bennet, Pamela Adlon and Debi Derryberry. One particularly strange choice they made, that’s a bit of a mixed bag in and of itself, was casting Saturday Night Live legend Phil Hartman as the cat Gigi. Now, in Japan, as we’ve discussed previously, there are certain animals that will usually be voiced by a male or female actor based on that animal's basic sound, regardless of the character’s actual gender. Most wolves, even females, are played by men. Most cats, male and female, are played by women. This is because a cat’s meow, objectively speaking, has a feminine register. So, in Japanese, Gigi the male cat was played by a woman, so if you’re jumping from one track to the other with no prior knowledge of this, the change can be kinda jarring.

Personally, I do believe this was a good change, at least in theory. Gigi may sound distinctly different, but in my opinion, he was kind of a boring character in the sub. He didn’t have much personality, he just rode alongside Kiki, giving her occasional advice and direction, and just generally worrying about shit. In the dub, however, Phil is able to portray all of this, but with a nagging, passive aggressive edge that might not make the character any more likeable, but he does give him more of a noticeable presence and defined personality throughout the movie. I also wouldn’t blame you for enjoying his performance purely for the nostalgia of it, since this was one of the last projects that Phil Hartman worked on before his untimely passing. He has chemistry with Kirsten, at least in a purely ‘uncle-niece’ kind of way that a mentor like him would usually have, so they do work well together. I should also mention, before I move onto the writing, that Matthew Lawrence plays Tombo, Kiki’s friend/kind of love interest, and he surprisingly doesn’t sound too old for the role, he actually fits the age of adolescence rather nicely.

Acting aside, if you've seen both the subbed and dubbed versions of this film, you’ll probably be aware that the dub features a heavy amount of rewrites, especially in regards to line reads that were added in where there was nothing but silence before. Some of this is pretty benign... Ursula saying “I know this guy” to take the stranger danger element out of a hitchhiking scene... And I’m not gonna lie, the extra material they gave Kirsten Dunst goes a long way towards establishing and endearing her character to the audience. She gives a lot more vocal reactions to what’s going on around her in her flying scenes, and she offers more commentary on the sights of the town, which works amazingly with her status as a fish out of water. The problem is, these extra lines are not nearly as beneficial to Gigi. He nagged Kiki enough to not become too annoying in the sub, but in the dub, he will not shut up during what are supposed to be quiet moments in the story, and almost none of his added material is funny or charming. There’s only one time it ever directly harms the movie, but that’s also a pretty huge spoiler, so we’re just going to have to talk about that later.

Anyway, the third dub is another version of the Disney dub, with a couple of the more egregious lines removed, old sound effects restored, and the original sub soundtrack also restored in place of the pop songs that Disney originally replaced it with. If you can find it, that’s the version I’d recommend.

Kiki’s Delivery Service is a special movie to a lot of people, especially among those who were around when it was released in the states. Moving back a little further, though, it was also special to Studio Ghibli, as it was their first real financial success. They had experienced critical success before, with Kiki being their fifth movie, but Kiki was the first that could really be described as a blockbuster, as it was by far the most successful Japanese movie of 1989. Jumping back ahead, when Disney made their original deal with Ghibli in the late nineties, Kiki was one of the first three they decided to redub(after the streamline dubs were already a thing) and out of that first batch, Kiki was by far the most popular. Released stateside in 1998, Kiki was the VHS you saw displayed proudly on store shelves, hell, this was how it became the first Studio Ghibli movie I ever heard of. I would even go as far as to say that, as popular as this film was, it probably set the stage for Spirited Away to become the monster smash hit that it was, turning Ghibli into a household name and ushering in a cultural demand for the entire Ghibli catalogue.

So what was it about Kiki’s Delivery service that touched the hearts of so many people? Well, we’ll get the obvious out of the way first... Kiki is extremely likeable. There are elements of Miyazaki’s writing style that I’ve never liked, but he has a definite knack for writing children, and I have it on good authority that for a crotchety old man, he’s unusually good at writing young girls. Kiki is friendly and cheerful, optimistic and sincere, with positive qualities that make her feel endearing without coming across as a Mary-Sue, and negative qualities that make her feel imperfect without coming off like a brat. You want her to succeed. You want to root for her. Sure, there are a few people she interacts with that you might not like very much... A snobby older witch who’s just finishing her training, and a couple of children who act ungrateful for the gifts that Kiki’s been hired to deliver... But none of them are portrayed negatively enough to feel genuinely awful, they just feel like real kids that we happened to look in on at a bad moment. The focus of the story is Kiki, and the main component that makes her story so engaging is that her character arc, particularly in the second half, appeals in very different... But equally substantial... Ways to both kids and adults.

For kids, Kiki’s story is that of an adolescent, transitioning from the innocence of childhood to the very first stages of burgeoning adulthood. This is an important age, where she’s going through some potentially scary changes that she can’t come back from. This is something every child is destined to go through, and I think even the younger kids who haven’t tasted this change yet themselves can still recognize it when they see it. This feeling of change and transition also appeals to adults, particularly those of us who have entered the working world, and have had to face the inevitable discovery of what it means to find the thing you want to dedicate your life to, only to wind up doing the same thing day in and day out with minimal success. It’s true that most people never manage to translate their actual passions into their dream job, but Kiki not only does exactly this, she has the kind of cool fantasy job that a kid would want to have... And yet, she still faces the same struggles that the rest of us do.

She struggles to find customers. She bends over backwards to succeed at every little job that she’s able to pick up, even as the hours cruelly tick by. She sacrifices her personal life to overcome unforeseen obstacles, just to wind up face to face with a rude customer who doesn’t give a shit. I’ll bet you anything that at some point in your life, you drifted off on the job and started fantasizing about how much better life would be if you had just gotten that dream job you wanted when you were a kid... Except Kiki DID get that job, and she’s dealing with the same bullshit that you are. Eventually, she was always going to experience burnout. Or, more appropriately, the magic was always going to fade, both literally and figuratively. It doesn’t take a genius media analyst to see the metaphor here, it’s called out pretty blatantly by Ursula during Kiki’s dry spell, but it’s still a fairly powerful one... There are some things that, once lost, you can never get back. The innocence of childhood, the luster of a brand new endeavor. But the magic in your heart? The passion surrounding your interests? You can find those again, provided you’re willing to make some compromises.

You can also kind of apply this message to Miyazaki himself, as he just seems like the kind of man who suffers creative burnout from time to time, and while this is all purely speculation on my part, it has always felt to me that he put a lot of himself into his movies, at least through the eighties and nineties. He really did have a knack for taking his personal experiences and presenting them in a relatable way to general audiences. More importantly, all of this is featured in a movie that’s fun and easy to watch, paced so well that the time just flies by, feeling at least a half an hour shorter than it actually is.. The tone is lighthearted from beginning to end, and despite the fact that it is largely a slice of life anime, it never gets boring, as there’s never anything pointless or uninteresting happening in the story. It’s delightful, gratifying entertainment, with enough substance and emotional resonance to make it feel just as special every time you watch it.

I should warn you, though, this movie does tend to feel oddly inappropriate at times. You do see Kiki in her underwear on a pretty constant basis, and while there’s nothing particularly revealing about them... They’re just an undershirt and big poofy bloomers... This is an anime we’re talking about, and upskirt pantyshots are always going to have a scandalous edge to them. There’s a scene where cows lick her bare feet, which I wouldn’t be talking about if I hadn’t seen that shot taken out of context a few too many times on Deviantart. It’s not too hard to see all of this as innocent and harmless cultural differences, like the bath scene in My Neighbor Totoro, but there is one glaring moment I can’t ignore. After Kiki’s artist friend offers to draw her, Gigi reacts by saying “Naked?” Which is just a really weird place to take that conversation. I initially thought they came up with that in the dub as a reference to Titanic, since the dub was released in 1998, but nope, it’s in the sub, too. I don’t know why they included that line, but it really hasn’t aged well. Parental guidance suggested.

And since we are hitting a slightly negative note, I guess it’s time to address that issue with the dub that I mentioned earlier, huh? Like I said before, there are going to be some spoilers here, so skip this paragraph if you haven’t seen the movie. Towards the end of the second act, Kiki loses two things... Her ability to fly, and her ability to talk to Gigi. Towards the end, she regains her flight, which represents the passion that she had to relearn and recontextualize, but she can no longer hear Gigi, which represents the childhood she’s leaving behind. Personally, I think the more practical explanation is that losing Gigi was like losing her training wheels, so she could learn to fly on her own, but I digress. In the original Disney dub, I’m guessing they thought that twist was sad, so they added the line “Kiki, can you hear me?” at the end, and I’m pretty sure everybody hated it, as it disrespected and shat all over the original intention of the ending, but thankfully, this issue has been addressed in more recent releases.

Speaking of more recent releases, the Disney releases of this movie are all out of print, but they’re not that difficult to find. I would still personally recommend the Gkids version, which fixed a lot of issues with the Disney dub. The original novel that inspired the movie, which I didn’t know about until just yesterday, is actually available in English as of 2021, written by Eko Kadono and published by Yearling. The live action adaptation, no I did not stutter, is not available stateside.

As much as I’ve sung its praises throughout this review, I don’t consider Kiki’s Delivery Service to necessarily be one of Studio Ghibli’s best films. There are other titles in the studio’s history that are deeper, better animated, more exciting, etc. Where Kiki’s stands out among its peers is that, in my opinion, it’s the most timeless Ghibli movie. It’s a story that can be enjoyed by anyone, of any age, of any gender, and of any culture, with almost no alienating elements holding it back. Despite the few little inappropriate snags I mentioned earlier, it’s also aged extremely well, and that’s considering the fact that Ghibli movies have a reputation for aging well in general. Even among the most iconic Ghibli masterpieces, there are films that certain audiences won’t understand the meaning of, or that certain people will find boring, or that are likely to get nitpicked into oblivion by anyone who isn’t blinded by the magic, but Kiki’s is accessible to everyone. It offers emotionally resonant, yet still mutually exclusive experiences for both children and adults, and it pulls off both in a manner that only becomes stronger with time.

I give Kiki’s Delivery Service an 8/10.