The 1995 Studio Ghibli film Whisper of the Heart, directed by Yoshifumi Kondo and written by Hayao Miyazaki, follows a young girl named Tsukishima Shizuku on her journey to finding and dedicating herself to her dreams and ambitions. The themes of struggling in school and navigating love for the first time lend themselves to the narrative, rather than dominating it, and help further develop the themes of creative ambition and the artistic process in both Shizuku’s own life and the lives of the people she meets along the way. Though it is also a story of her friendship with Yuko, her mentorship with Mr. Nishi, and her budding relationship with…