harmful v. harmless

Tonight I watched Miyazaki's Nausicaa for the very first time. I was impressed; although I wasn't expecting the messages that I recieved. Before this class I had only seen My Neighbor Totoro. I was young when I saw it for the first time and some of the intellectual messages must have passed over my unsuspecting head. Many had talked about Miyazaki's environmental messages and I wasn't really aware of how those would manifest in such "cute" movies.

I think my favorite scene from this movie was when Princess Nausicaa finds the Omu shell in the forest. She says something like, how can things this beautiful be harmful. That moment foreshadowed one plot points in the movie. That actually, the forest was not harmful and instead only protecting itself. I think Nuassicaa really grapples with the themes of protection, isolation, and how to react to destruction. I was awed at the detail of the animation and have come home to my roommate and reccomended she watch it.

I wonder how men react to the movie.I always assumed that a strong lead female, like Naussicaa, would alienate a male audience. Although, I guess the sci-fi type genre might alienate part of the female audience.