Why is there always a chinchilla at the beginning of Miyazaki Hayao's animation?

Well, Studio Ghibli is a film studio set up by the famous producer Suzuki Toshi Utsumi for Miyazaki Hayao. The studio has been working on the principle of making high-level animated films, so Studio Ghibli basically only produces one work a year.

However, as an independent animation company, it is quite dangerous for Studio Ghibli to produce only one work a year. Because it is very difficult to run such a company in Japan with high prices and high monthly salary. Although the works of the studio are profitable, the profits are meager in the face of huge salary ... -_-b~ That is to say, Studio Ghibli has been in a bad business state for a long time, and all of them are supporting their own businesses. (Sunrise and other companies have several novels a year, alas ~) In addition, Japan was in a recession for a while, and the new works of Miyazaki Hayao and Takada Xun were not very popular, so Ghibli was in a major crisis. ...

Then, Miyazaki Hayao made a film "My Neighbor Totoro". If this film still can't save the status quo, the company will have to face the danger of bankruptcy.

Fortunately, My Neighbor Totoro with excellent quality was discovered by a commodity company and surrounded by a large number of people. Moreover, the lovely totoro was sold in large quantities, which saved the company in one fell swoop and gave the company a considerable savings to do meaningful work such as training new people. Until now, a considerable part of the studio's economic source comes from the goods of my neighbor totoro.

Therefore, a great event made My Totoro a symbol of Studio Ghibli.

Some of the works we see now have a blue background at the beginning of the DVD version, which was added later. Before the incident, Studio Ghibli didn't have this logo. However, even the cinema will add a logo similar to my neighbor totoro at the beginning of the film as a souvenir.

Above.