Kiki
This is Kiki's story of the beginning of her year away from home. She and her black cat Jiji run into a little trouble at first, but they soon make friends in their new city by the sea.
Under the shining full moon, people gather to send Kiki off. Kiki, a witch-in-training, is now 13 years old and according to a tradition, she has to leave her home to spend a year alone in a new town to establish herself as a full witch. Kissing her mom and dad good-bye, Kiki sets herself on her mother's broom with her father's transistor radio and her closest companion, Jiji the black cat, at her side. And she flies off - to a new town, to a new adventure, and to a new life.
Finding herself a beautiful seaside city of Korico, Kiki sets up a flying delivery service, to take advantage of the only magic she knows - flying a broom.
However, her magic does not make Kiki happy or successful overnight. Miyazaki says, "In this movie, magic just means some kinds of talents that today's girls have" and Kiki is "a girl who tries to be herself by flying".
Kiki encounters several setbacks and mishaps that an upcoming young entrepreneur would typically face - slow business, misplaced merchandise, not-so-nice customers, and a rainy day (literally!). Kiki also has to deal with her feelings such as loneliness, worries, shyness, and self-doubt, as a teenage girl in a new town. Miyazaki says, "the ability to fly frees her from what is going on on the ground, but freedom also means worries and loneliness", and she has to face and overcome such problems to really become self-sufficient and independent.
Her biggest challenge comes when Kiki loses her magic. Flying, which was as natural to Kiki as breathing, no longer comes so easily to her. Miyazaki says that talent is something that you are given, and you have to go through a process to consciously make such a talent truely yours.
Kiki overcomes such obstacles with her energy and resourcefulness, and with help from nice people she meets in the course of her adventure. Osono and her baker husband, who gave Kiki a place to stay, take good care of Kiki as sort of surrogate parents. Tombo, a boy whose biggest dream is to fly, befriends Kiki and makes her laugh. Grandmotherly Madame, for whom Kiki delivers a pie, treats Kiki with kindness and care to give Kiki the energy to go on. And a young painter, Ursula, gives Kiki good advice as someone who not so long ago went through the same struggle as Kiki is going through now.
In the end, Kiki finds her independence and the meaning of self-reliance. In her letter to her parents, Kiki writes, "There are still some times when I feel a little homesick, but all in all I sure love this city!" as she flies over Korico, which she now calls home.
Kiki The main and title character of the film. She aspires to become a good witch like her mother, and for this reason, she had to leave home at the age of 13 for one year in order to complete her witches' training. However, Kiki does not know many spells or posses talents in a great assortment of witchcrafts. Some witches know how to make potions, there are those who know to tell fortune, but all Kiki knows is how to fly on her broom stick (and she has difficulty in doing that most of the time!) Neverthless, Kiki is not afraid of going off by herself with only her flying skills. She has a great enthusiasim for life and takes her optimisim with her everywhere. She is a kind and warm-hearted person and is always willing to help out others before helping herself.
Jiji is Kiki's cute and quirky talking cat. He is completely in black expect for his big white eyes. Jiji is a very interesting character and it is hard to give him a specific personality. He cares for Kiki a great deal as shown when he even pretended to be a doll under the abuse of a very very bad child just so that he could help Kiki (You need to see the movie to understand the situation better ^_^;; ) Later in the movie however, he stopped talking to Kiki because she grew up and therefore her special childhood connection to her cat changed. Jiji got married to the sophisicated cat next door and the pair started their own cat family.
Tombo was one of Kiki's first friend in the new city. He met her the first day she arrived and helped Kiki escape from the traffic police officer (her broom went out of control and caused quite a commotion) by yelling "Thief, thief!" to distract the officer. However, Kiki did not like him at first and was actually very snobbish towards Tombo. Nevertheless, Tombo would not give up. He was fascinated by Kiki and her flying abilities and was willing to do anything to be her friend. Tombo dreamed of flying and spent a great deal of effort and time building his "bicyle-airplane". Tombo is a very likeable boy and his persistence in winning Kiki's friendship as well as achieving his dream of flying deserves to be be admired.
Ursula first met Kiki when Kiki came to her little cottage in the forest in order to retrieve a cat doll (the Jiji look-alike) that she lost. The two girls became fast friends, even though their personalities seem to differ in many places. At the age of 18 years old, Ursula is five years older than Kiki. She lives by herself in her summer cottage and spend her days painting. She is an extremely talented artist and draws both life-objects as well as fantasy. Urusla is very outgoing and even tomboyish. She likes Kiki a great deal and feels inspired by Kiki for one of her paintings.
Mr. Osono is a very quiet man. Although he doesn't talk to Kiki much (he doesn't talk to anyone else much either) he cares for Kiki a great deal as shown by his concern whenever Kiki was late returning from her delieveries. Mr. Osono even spent a great deal of time making a special shop sign for Kiki's Delivery Service which is displayed on the window of his bakery shop.
Kokiri is a very good witch and specializes in making herbal medicine. Every witch has a special talent and to make medicine was her specialty. Kokiri was at first hesitate to let Kiki leave home because she felt Kiki was too young (but then, I think all mothers think their daughers are too young to leave home ^_^). However, after seeing her daughter's enthusiasim, Kokiri gave her blessing by making a special dress for Kiki as well as giving her broom to Kiki.
Okino is not a warlock (male Witch) but rather just a plain-old-regular human. He first met Kokiri (Kiki's Mom) when she was 13 years old and arrived at his town to begin her witch training. Okino was also hesitant to let Kiki leave home at such a young age, but like Kokiri, he put aside his own disappointment and gave Kiki his blessings.
Madame is the kind old lady in the city who in a way adopts Kiki as her granddaughter. Madame is very kind and lives in a beautiful old house with her companion Bertha. Madame's daughter and granddaughter live quite far away and rarely visit Madame. When Madame sent her specialty, a herring and pumpkin pot pie, to her Granddaughter for her birthday party, the granddaughter looked at the pie disgustingly rather than be grateful for what her Grandmother had done. Madame likes Kiki a lot and although they have not known each other for a very long time, a special bond had already been formed between them.
Bertha is Madame's loyal companion. Bertha is very fascinated by Kiki's broom and whenever Kiki visits Madame, Bertha would go into the hall and try to fly on the broom.