In my opinion Miyazaki's films do nothing for me. I far prefer Takahata's more realist approach. The thing that is often said about Takahata's films is that they're films that just happen to be animated, whereas Miyazaki's works are very much animations (although he did take Takahata's approach sometimes, like with The Wind Rises). Like in my opinion no Ghibli film devastates like Only Yesterday does. It just hits so hard, as an adult. Takahata was concerned more with human emotion and human flaws, whereas Miyazaki often liked to wrap his allegories up with fantastical lands and usually used child protagonists. Takahata doesn't do that, he preferred to just show everything how it is, warts and all. I think the best way to contrast them is to recall that My Neighbour Totoro was actually released as a double bill with Grave of the Fireflies. Could you get two more different approaches to animation? Whilst Miyazaki may have been a better storyteller, he never came close to Takahata when it comes to truly moving an audience.
