Castle in the Sky

Laputa: The Castle in the Sky (天空の城ラピュタ Tenkū no Shiro Rapyuta) (re-titled Castle in the Sky for release in the United States) is a 1986 Japanese animated adventure film written and directed by Hayao Miyazaki that marked the cinematic feature debut of Studio Ghibli. It follows the adventures of a young boy and girl attempting to keep a magic crystal from a group of military agents, while searching for a legendary floating castle.

The film was distributed by Toei Kabushiki Kaisha. Laputa: Castle in the Sky won the Animage Anime Grand Prix in 1986.

Dubbing History
An English-dubbed version, produced by Magnum Video Tape and Dubbing for international Japan Airlines flights at the request of Tokuma Shoten, was released theatrically in Hong Kong on June 26, 1987. It was also briefly screened in the United States by Streamline Pictures in 1989 and 1990, as well as being aired on UK television on New Years Eve in 1988 and on at least one more following occasion in the early 1990s. Carl Macek, the head of Streamline, was disappointed with this dub, deeming it "adequate, but clumsy". Following this, Tokuma allowed Streamline to dub their future acquisitions My Neighbor Totoro and Kiki's Delivery Service. The Magnum-produced dub of Castle in the Sky was released only on the Japanese Studio Ghibli Laserdisc Collection in 1996 and on the first Region 2 DVD release in 2002, both of which are now out of print. The later Japanese DVD and Blu-ray releases instead utilize Disney's dub.

The Disney-produced English dub was recorded in 1998 and planned for release on video in 1999, but the release was canceled after Princess Mononoke did not fare as well in the US as Japan, and so Laputa ' s release date was pushed back yet again; on occasion, the completed dub was screened at select children's festivals. The film was finally released on DVD and video in the US on August 16, 2003 alongside a re-release of Kiki's Delivery Service and Spirited Away. As with Mononoke and Kiki, critical opinion was mixed about the new dub, but Cloris Leachman and Mark Hamill's performances as Dola and Muska drew praise.

Although the plot and much of the script was left intact, Disney's English dub of Castle in the Sky contains some changes, including added background chatter and one-liners where dialogue was not originally present, and most notably an extended and partly re-orchestrated score by original composer Joe Hisaishi to fill in moments of silence. Although all these alterations were approved by Studio Ghibli and Miyazaki, some critics have called them into question. Regarding the soundtrack, according to Steve Alpert's memoir Sharing a House with the Never-Ending Man: 15 Years at Studio Ghibli, Miyazaki himself gave the go ahead for and approved of Hisaishi's reworking. Post 2010 releases of the film undo a large amount of these changes, including the music score and added dialogue. Recently, however, the film has been re-released by GKids with two different mixes of the Disney dub: one with the original score, and one with the revised score.