Although the title invokes Totoro, My Neighbors the Yamadas eschews fairy-tale creatures in favor of hilarious and heartbreaking vignettes from everyday family life.
Although the title invokes Totoro, My Neighbors the Yamadas eschews fairy-tale creatures in favor of hilarious and heartbreaking vignettes from everyday family life. That's not the only way it differs from typical Ghibli fare. This Isao Takahata film is animated in a unique style more reminiscent of newspaper comic strips than the fantasy epics that populate the rest of this list. My Neighbors the Yamadas was perhaps a little too unique for Japanese viewers, who rejected it at the box office, but its stylistic experiments have stood the test of time. — C.H.