a review of 风之谷

Nausicaä was a Ghibli classic I still hadn't seen, and it didn't disappoint. I loved the imaginative, semi-psychedelic retro-fantasy elements and atmosphere, the matching music and the retro drawing style, reminiscent of Remi: Nobody's Boy from the late 1970s. The story felt like an intriguing mix of Dune (1965 novel), Fantastic Planet (1973) and Star Wars (1977), with sci-fi elements reminiscent of the work of Jean "Moebius" Giraud (1938 – 2012). There were also surreal fantasy elements that pleasantly made me think of my all-time favorite comic: a relatively obscure, surreal and wonderfully imaginative 1970s fantasy comic series called Philémon, by Frédéric "Fred" Aristidès (1931 – 2013). Nausicaä would have gotten more than four out of five stars if it would have been a little less lengthy. At a certain point, the actions of the villagers became farcically hysterical, which made me lose my involvement for a short while, but the magic was soon restored.