--- description: Find out why Hayao Miyazaki is one of the 100 most influential people of 2024. title: Hayao Miyazaki: The 100 Most Influential People of 2024 image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltfac9e53c75576fd2/698a559216d8845229c3e888/time-100-2024-Hayao-Miyazaki.jpg?branch=production&width=3840&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 --- Apr 17, 2024 # Hayao Miyazaki by Guillermo del Toro  Arai I discovered Hayao Miyazaki’s Toei Animation films as a child—films like _The Wonderful World of Puss ’n Boots_ and series like _Heidi and Marco,_ in which his style and influence became increasingly identifiable. Encountering _My Neighbor Totoro_ as an adult, my mind snapped back to those earlier works, and I recognized how much this man had shaped my childhood. Miyazaki’s work provokes that rare emotion—the shiver of recognition of a type of beauty that is impossible in the real world and thus exists only in his films. Yet he is also a brutal realist regarding greed, war, and human rage. He knows that we shape and destroy the planet and that humans are the best and the worst of our world. He is entirely genuine. A one-of-a-kind creator who exists fully in his art. He is the single most influential [animation](https://time.com/6081937/spirited-away-changed-animation-studio-ghibli/ "undefined") director in the history of the medium, and one of my top 10 favorite storytellers in any audiovisual medium. _The Boy and the Heron_ is a subtle masterpiece that exerts a gravitational pull—and many of us feel that pull intensely. _Del Toro is an Oscar-winning director and producer_ ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"Article","@id":"https://time.com/collections/100-most-influential-people-2024/6964119/hayao-miyazaki/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/collections/100-most-influential-people-2024/6964119/hayao-miyazaki/"},"headline":"Hayao Miyazaki","datePublished":"2024-04-17T11:10:36.000Z","dateModified":"2026-03-03T02:28:02.390Z","description":"","url":"https://time.com/collections/100-most-influential-people-2024/6964119/hayao-miyazaki/","keywords":["TIME100","franchise","Magazine","Special Project","sponsorshipblock","Accolades","2024TIME100","T100ICONS2024"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltfac9e53c75576fd2/698a559216d8845229c3e888/time-100-2024-Hayao-Miyazaki.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"TIME Staff","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/time-staff/"}],"creator":"TIME Staff","articleSection":"","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltfac9e53c75576fd2/698a559216d8845229c3e888/time-100-2024-Hayao-Miyazaki.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/collections/100-most-influential-people-2024/6964119/hayao-miyazaki/","name":"Hayao Miyazaki"}}]},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"VideoObject","name":"See Everyone on the TIME100 2024 list","description":"","thumbnailUrl":"https://cdn.jwplayer.com/v2/media/73p9kgIN/poster.jpg?width=720","uploadDate":"2024-04-17T11:00:00.000Z","contentUrl":"https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/73p9kgIN.m3u8","embedUrl":"https://time.com/collections/100-most-influential-people-2024/6964119/hayao-miyazaki/","duration":"PT1M59S","potentialAction":{"@type":"SeekToAction","target":"https://time.com/collections/100-most-influential-people-2024/6964119/hayao-miyazaki/?jw_start={seek_to_second_number}","startOffset-input":"required name=seek_to_second_number"}}] ```