Princess Mononoke Themes

Most of Miyazaki's characters are dynamic, capable of change, and not easily caricatured into traditional good-evil dichotomies. Many menacing characters have redeeming features, and are not firmly defined as antagonists. In Princess Mononoke, Lady Eboshi destroys the forest for industrial raw materials without the concerns for animals' life; however lepers and former prostitutes that she shelters have great respect for her. The film culminates in reconciliation, rather than the vanquishing of some irredeemable evil. This theme is unusual for an animated film, as most films in the medium clearly divide good and evil.[citation needed]
Miyazaki stated in Spirited Away, "the heroine [is] thrown into a place where the good and bad dwell together.
Simple stereotypes cannot be used, even in children's films. Even though Miyazaki sometimes feels pessimistic about the world, he prefers to show children a positive world view instead.[2]
Some of Miyazaki's early films featured distinctly evil villains, as in Castle of Cagliostro or Castle in the Sky; other films are remarkable for having no villains at all, as in Kiki's Delivery Service and My Neighbor Totoro. Some of these have a strong flavour of traditional Japanese culture and Shinto, or ancient animistic spiritual
This ecological consciousness is echoed in Princess Mononoke with the giant primordial forest, trees, flowers and wolves. In Spirited Away, Miyazaki's environmental concerns surface in the "stink spirit", a river spirit who has been polluted and who must be cleansed in the bath house. Miyazaki explains in the DVD commentary that the inspiration for this scene was a personal experience of his own when he helped to clean a polluted river near his home. This theme is also reflected in the story of the river spirit Haku, whose river had been destroyed by a building project. In Miyazaki's most recent film, Ponyo, Ponyo's father shows a strong dislike for humans and their filth. This is evidenced by the disgusting condition of the bay area where Sosuke lives and the net catching nothing but garbage that also forces Ponyo into a glass bottle.
In Princess Mononoke, Castle in the Sky and Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind, the ecological paradise is threatened by military men and violent state-controlled armies. In each film, the conflict between the natural way of life and the military destruction of culture, land and resources is central to the plight of the protagonists. When battle scenes are shown in each, the militaristic music and ecological destruction is paramount to the endangerment of the inhabitants of the