1. Compare and Contrast Essay between two anime movies.
Spirited Away and Castle in the Sky
Studio Ghibli is a Japanese animation film studio. The founder of this studio – Miyazaki
Hayao, had created a lot of best known anime feature films such as Totoro, Castle in the Sky,
Grave of the Fireflies, Only Yesterday, Ponyo, Spirited Away and so on. I enjoy watching those
anime movies created by Studio Ghibli is because most of their anime movies have deep meaning
and bring related messages to inspire us. Besides, the illustrations of these movies also brings me
a lot of ideas in designing. The two anime movies I love the most are from Studio Ghibli which
are “Spirited Away” and “Castle in the sky”. There are some similarities between these two
movies which are the genre of the movie, the main structure of the story, the changes of the
personality of the main character and the moral values that the movie conveyed.
First of all, the similarities between these two movies is the genre of the movie. The story
of “Spirited Away” is about a ten-year-old girl, Chihiro Ogino and her parents were moving to
their new home when her father took a wrong turn. They unknowingly entered an uninhabited
city and Chihiro’s parents transformed into pigs because of devoured the fresh food from those
empty, but seemingly-operational restaurant stall. After that the story moving on with how
Chihiro met a guy, Haku by helping her to transform back her parents into human and back to
her living world. While the “Castle in the Sky” is talking about a girl with a magic crystal, Sheeta
been abducted by Muska, a secret agent working for the government in a flying ship. This is
because they needed Sheeta and her magic crystal to enter the castle in the sky, Laputa. Along
the way to Laputa, Sheeta was rescued by her powerful crystal necklace which floats her down
to safety. She was recovered by a young resourceful boy, Pazu who works in a small mining town.
After that the story behind is about Pazu and Sheeta have shared a common desire to see Laputa,
so they decided to team up to outrun the pirates and the military. These two movies are kind of
adventure movie by showing us how are the main characters escape from those bad characters
and achieve their success.
Furthermore, the main structure of character from these two movies is also quite similar.
From the movie “Spirited Away”, the main character, Chihiro met a guy, Haku who helped her to
2. escape from the spirit world. Haku advised Chihiro to demand a job from the bathhouse's boiler-
man so that he can find the ways to save her parents when Chihiro felt anxiety and perplexity
after she saw her parents transformed into pigs. Haku also encouraged Chihiro to never give up
when she encountered difficulties. Haku always accompany by Chihiro side to help her until she
and her parents leave the spirit world. In the movie “Castle in the sky”, the main character Sheeta
also met a guy, Pazu who helped her escaped from Muska and reached Laputa. Pazu rushed to
catch Sheeta when he saw her slowly descending from the sky and after that Pazu decided to
brought Sheeta back to his house. Pazu and Sheeta have the common desire to see Laputa, so
Pazu decided to accompany by Sheeta side until they reached Laputa. Pazu also comfort Sheeta
when she felt sad and helpless. The main structure of the character from these two movies is
quite similar is because Haku and Pazu are the second character from these two movies which
connived the main character to achieve their goals.
Moreover, the changes in personality of the main character also the similarly thing
between these two movies. In the beginning of the movie “Spirited Away”, Chihiro is a spoiled
and overprotected girl by her parents. This has caused her became an emotional girl who easily
to get angry with others. Chihiro also a timid and immature girl as she scared to enter the
uninhabited city even her parents were accompanying her. However, after the end of the story,
Chihiro became a strong and courageous girl. When Yubaba, the head of the spirit world changed
Chihiro’s name to Sen, Chihiro seems to lose her true identity. Chihiro desperately holds on to
her former self because if she forgets who she used to be, she’ll be trapped in the spirit world
forever. Chihiro not afraid to face any trouble and tried her best to save herself and her parents
back to their living world. Chihiro also became more responsible on her demeanor. For the initial
part of the movie “Castle in the Sky”, Sheeta was a shy and timid girl. She had abducted by Muska
been a long time and this caused her afraid to know new people. She always be alone and worry
a lot of thing. After going through lot of incidents, Sheeta became to a strong and a brave girl.
She met Pazu and team up together with him and decided to go to save Laputa. At the ending of
the story, she also fights with Muska to prevent them from destroying Laputa.
Last but not least, the moral values that bring out from these two movies also one of the
similarity between these two movies. From these two movies “Spirited Away” and “Castle in the
3. Sky”, I have learned that we should not give up easily no matter how hard the situation we meet.
We should be like Chihiro and Sheeta that brave and strong to protect our friends and family or
reverie. Besides, these two movies also taught us that we must learn to grow after we met and
solved a situation. We must learn how to be independent and do not be too overprotected by
our parents.
As a conclusion, there are four similarities between “Spirited Away” and “Castle in the
Sky” these two animated movie, there are the genre of the movie, the main structure of the story,
the changes of the personality of the main character and the moral values that the movie
conveyed. Anime movies are not only for kids, for teenagers like us, we also can learn a lots of
things while watching these types of movies.
