My Neighbor Totoro (龍貓)

It was the third anime film on ATV screen yesterday. The story is a simple one about two young daughters, Satsuki(草子) and Mei (次子), of a professor called Kusakabe and their interactions with friendly wood spirits in postwar rural Japan. I found the two girls very lovely, especially the younger one, Mei.

This is the plot supplied by Wikipedia:

In 1958, a university professor and his two daughters, Satsuki and Mei, moved into an old house in rural Japan to be closer to the hospital where his wife was recovering from an illness. The daughters found that the house was inhabited by tiny animated dust creatures called soot sprites — small house spirits seen when moving from light to dark places. When the girls became comfortable in their new house and laughed with their father, the soot spirits left.















While she is playing outside one day, the younger daughter, Mei, saw two white, rabbit-like ears in the grass. She follows the ears under the house where she discovered two small magical creatures, who led her through a briar patch, and into the hollow of a large Camphor Laurel tree. She met and befriended a larger version of the same kind of spirit, which identified itself by a series of roars she interpreted as "Totoro". Her father later told her that this was the "keeper of the forest".
















One rainy night the girls were waiting for their father's bus and grew worried when he did not arrive on the bus they expected him on. As they waited, Mei eventually fell asleep on Satsuki's back and Totoro appeared beside them, allowing Satsuki to see him for the first time. He only had a leaf on his head for protection against the rain, so Satsuki offered him the umbrella she had taken along for her father. Totoro was delighted at both the shelter and the sounds made upon it by falling raindrops. In return he gave her a bundle of nuts and seeds. A bus-shaped giant cat halted at the stop, and Totoro boarded it, taking the umbrella. Shortly after, their father’s bus arrived.














The girls planted the seeds. A few days later they awaken at midnight to find Totoro and his two miniature colleagues engaged in a ritual dance around the planted nuts and seeds. The girls joined in, whereupon the seeds sprout and then grew into an enormous tree. Totoro took his colleagues and the girls for a ride on a magical flying top. In the morning, the tree was gone, but the seeds had indeed sprouted.















Mei, believing her mother's condition had worsened, set off on foot to the hospital and got lost. Desperate to find her sister, Satsuki returned to the camphor laurel tree and pleaded for Totoro's help. Delighted to be of assistance, he summoned the Catbus, which rescued Mei, then whisked her and Satsuki over the countryside to see their mother in the hospital. The girls perched in a tree outside of the hospital to discover that their mother was doing well. They placed an ear of corn that Mei believes would speed her mother's recovery, and then returned home on the Catbus. When the Catbus departed, it faded away from the girls' sight.























The closing credits show Mei and Satsuki's mother returning home and feature scenes of Satsuki and Mei playing with other human children, with Totoro and his friends as unseen observers.