Week 4: Naussica Screening 2

During the second screening of Naussica I was able to take a more analytic approach to the film, therefore I want to go a little deeper than just my surface reactions. The film contains so many thematic subtitles that range from the obvious environmental message to how the human condition affects a seemingly infinite world (not infinite in terms of preserving the current state, but infinite in terms of existing in some incarnation i.e. the post apocalyptic world), however for the purpose of this blog post, I want to focus on a couple topics I found most interesting:

- change (or lack thereof) in Naussica as a character.
- how finite beings interact with an infinite world.

First of all, it is clear that this film is centered around the main character Naussica who seems to a perfect character. She is at the top of a very atypical monarchy in that the members of the royal family are loved and revered by all, and they return that same love and respect to the people. She also possesses a very inquisitive mind, strong work ethic, a power over nature and animals that not even Lord Yupa has, and an infinite sense of selflessness (taking off her mask in the forest to calm the hostages, standing in front of the Ohmu stampede to stop their advance). Because of all this Miyazaki leaves little to no room for improvement. As the film progresses, it becomes obvious that Naussica does not change much at all as a character (besides the brief fit or rage following the murder of her father, which she spends the rest of the film atoning for). Thinking about this, the only reason I could think of for this consistency is to use her as a reference point from which to observe the change in all other peoples.