Environmental themes in Japanese animation

So, I have a nerdy confession to make. Last December we bought a new lap top for me and named it "Agito" after the main character from the animated film "Origin: Spirits of the Past." I was so taken with the film and its interpretation of the nature vs. man theme that I have even given some thought into incorporating its images into a tattoo design. Films like Origin, Princess Mononoke, Howls Moving Castle, and Nausica are a few amongst a sub category of animated epics, many coming out of the Japanese animation studio "Studio Ghibli," whose moral underline fall closely to those of our little family. Yes, the films do have some scenes of violent acts but I do not find these scenes to stand out as brutal simply for the sake of shock value. Rather they seem to take lessons from our past, a past dotted with acts of humanitarian and environmental atrocity, and transpose them onto a new landscape where one can feel compassion for a wide range of characters including humans, animals, gods, demons, and even the land its self. It is interesting to me that the characters in these films are rarely polarised to one side of good or evil and I believe that in this they represent a more realistic interpretation of humanity and the natural world. These are the types of stories that I want my daughter to grow up remembering. I remember how shocked I was to learn that Studio Ghibli, the animation studio brain child of Hayao Miyazaki, had close ties to Disney in the US market. Only recently did I learn of the fighting that took place between Miyazaki and Disney over the release of his films in the US. It seems that Disney, Miramax, and a few other distributors have tried to heavily edit the content and even change plot points of the films for the US market. Now that sounds more like the Disney that I know! Fortunately Miyazaki stood up to the corporate power houses and though the films US release dates were often pushed back for months they maintained their original philosophical and artistic integrity. We recently began watching the Nickelodeon animated series "Avatar: The last air bender" and have happily discovered it to be a close similarity to the environmental themes of the before mentioned films. If you have not watched the series I highly recommend checking it out as well as the following list of movies.

Naussicaa of the Valley of the Wind

Castle in the Sky

My Neighbor Totoro

Princess Mononoke

Spirited Away

Howls Moving Castle

Origin: Spirits of the Past

WALL-E

Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within