posted on by Rafael Antonio Pineda
‘Moving Castle’ ad commemorates Valley of Witches area’s March 16 opening
Studio Ghibli unveiled a new 15-second animated commercial for its Ghibli Park on Tuesday, commemorating the upcoming March 16 opening of the park’s “Valley of Witches” area. The commercial features a moving castle evocative of Howl’s Moving Castle.
Hayao Miyazaki storyboarded the commercial. Akihiko Yamashita, who was the character designer and animation director of Howl’s Moving Castle, directed the commercial, while that film’s art director Noboru Yoshida also served as art director for the commercial. According to the studio’s producer Toshio Suzuki, Hayao Miyazaki‘s son Goro Miyazaki requested that his father produce the commercial.
The Ghibli Park opened on November 1, 2022, two years behind its original opening schedule in 2020.
The Dondoko Forest, Ghibli’s Grand Warehouse and Hill of Youth areas are all open for the public. The park takes up about 7.1 hectares (about 17.5 acres) of the existing 194-hectare (about 479-acre) Aichi Expo Memorial Park, where the World Expo 2005 was held. The park’s Mononoke Forest area opened in November 2023.
The park started selling tickets internationally online in January 2023.
Studio Ghibli also maintains The Ghibli Museum, located in Mitaka in west Tokyo. The Ghibli Museum has interactive exhibits and replicas of iconic Ghibli creations, and it offers a rotating screening of different Ghibli-animated shorts.
Source: Press release
