The Boy and the Heron

While the Second World War rages, the teenage Mahito, haunted by his mother's tragic death, is relocated from Tokyo to the serene rural home of his new stepmother Natsuko, a woman who bears a striking resemblance to the boy's mother. As he tries to adjust, this strange new world grows even stranger following the appearance of a persistent gray heron, who perplexes and bedevils Mahito, dubbing him the "long-awaited one."

Broadly celebrated as a late-career summation from Miyazaki, the film weaves motifs from across his filmography into something darker and more personal than most of his work — deliberately dense, sometimes disorienting, and richer on repeat viewing. The lone significant dissent is about pace and accessibility rather than quality, with some finding it a gentler, slower entry into his canon rather than a towering revelation.