Hayao Miyazaki : The Walt Disney of Japan

Hayao Miyazaki

Hayao Miyazaki was born on January 5th, 1941 in the Bunkyo Ward of Tokyo. As a child, he expressed interest in manga and animation. Miyazaki first moved into the professional animation when he joined Toei Animation in 1963. Here, he worked as an in-between artist helping to produce films like Doggie March and Gulliver's Travels Beyond the Moon. In 1973, he moved and joined Nippon Animation and directed Future Boy Conan.

Princess Mononoke 

After going from studio to studio, he decided to start Studio Ghibli in 1985. Here, Miyazaki directed a slew of well adored animated classics such as Castle in the Sky in 1986, My Neighbor Totoro in 1988, and Porco Rosso in 1992. All his films were successful, garnering positive reviews. His first real claim to fame was with Princess Mononoke  which some called "the Star Wars of animated feature."  Princess Mononoke was the first animated film to win the Japan Academy Picture of the Year Award. Princess Mononoke  was also the film to greatly increase the popularity of Studio Ghibli in the West.

Spirited Away 

In 2001, Miyazaki released Spirited Away , his most successful production. It received the Academy Award for Best Animated Feature at the 75th Academy Awards and considered one of the best films of the 2000s.

Miyazaki continued to release films through Studio Ghibli, such as Ponyo, Howl's Moving Castle, and The Wind Rises. He retired at 72.

Miyazaki entered his projects blind, letting the project grow organically by taking inspiration from multiple places rather than building upon a predetermined narrative skeleton. He drew upon his own life ,especially from his childhood,  and those around him for ideas concerning character creation and events taking place in the movie. For the setting, he would often stare at different landscapes and develop a story just from those pictures. This loose approach to creation can be attributed to how Miyazaki observed children create art. He said," children make great art just by doing. They don’t think, they do and do, make and make, wasting shocking amounts of paper and art supplies, indifferent to quality, but fearlessly making art in a state of playful, Seussian quasi-thinking."

Miyazaki Thinking

While the following statement might seem contradictory to the previous portion, Miyazaki loved just to sit and think. In an interview with Vice, he said ," My [creative] process is thinking, thinking and thinking—thinking about my stories for a long time ... If you have a better way, please let me know."He also utilized the subconscious to resolve writing block he experiences stating ,"I try to fish out my own dreams by dangling a fishing line into my subconscious, but they don't catch very well. When I get stuck on ideas, I have to dig down deep into my subconscious, past the surface of my mind that no longer seems helpful, to find some interesting way to resolve the drama in my films."

Miyazaki has been extremely successful in his career as a result of his childish approach to creation and deep relationship with his subconscious. For more information about his creative process, check out the documentary Never-Ending Man: Hayao Miyazaki out on December 13. 


Sources
http://thecreativehours.com/thinking-and-the-creative-process/
https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/vvyb4m/8-pearls-of-wisdom-from-hayao-miyazaki
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y_x9XinXMqw
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hayao_Miyazaki







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