The A.V. Club by Tasha Robinson

For all its goodhearted cheer, Pom Poko is a glum indictment of modern Japan's disjunction from the natural and spiritual world. But it strikes a positive final note by implying that those worlds still exist, just out of sight, waiting and flourishing.

The New York Times by Mike Hale

The best film by Isao Takahata, who started the studio with Mr. Miyazaki, this is a comic allegory about battling packs of tanuki (Japanese raccoon dogs) joining forces to fight human real estate developers. It’s earthy and rollicking in a way that his co-founder’s films aren’t.

Slant Magazine by Chris Cabin

Takahata’s wondrous film is itself at constant interplay between the unsentimental realities of human progress (and expansion) and the unbound thoughts and creative perspectives that fantasy can entertain without necessarily being reduced to mere entertainment.

Chicago Reader

The film is surprisingly mature in its depiction of community dynamics and its sobering conclusion, which addresses the real-life costs of environmental devastation. The visual design veers from fantasy to naturalism, depending on the tone of the story: the tanuki appear sometimes as Disneyesque cuddlies and other times as realistic-looking rodents.

IndieWire

Its broad, slapstick send-up of human foibles prefigures Takahata’s more pointed My Neighbors, the Yamadas (1999). At 119 minutes, the film feels a bit long and the story rambles, albeit genially.

Chicago Reader by Ben Sachs

The film is surprisingly mature in its depiction of community dynamics and its sobering conclusion, which addresses the real-life costs of environmental devastation. The visual design veers from fantasy to naturalism, depending on the tone of the story: the tanuki appear sometimes as Disneyesque cuddlies and other times as realistic-looking rodents.

IndieWire by Charles Solomon

Its broad, slapstick send-up of human foibles prefigures Takahata’s more pointed My Neighbors, the Yamadas (1999). At 119 minutes, the film feels a bit long and the story rambles, albeit genially.

Time Out

Thankfully, the proceedings are carefully anchored in what are palpably human concerns, namely the cohabitation of humans and wildlife and the environmental cost of widespread urbanisation, and while this is not quite up there with best of the studio’s output, it’s still a striking and universally pleasurable experience.

Time Out by Staff (Not Credited)

Thankfully, the proceedings are carefully anchored in what are palpably human concerns, namely the cohabitation of humans and wildlife and the environmental cost of widespread urbanisation, and while this is not quite up there with best of the studio’s output, it’s still a striking and universally pleasurable experience.

Austin Chronicle by Richard Whittaker

At its best, there's an undoubted thrill and wonder to Pom Poko, like the massive parade of phantoms the tanuki conjure up as one of their harebrained schemes. Takahata's misfire at least provides some wonderful sparkles.

The New York Times by Andy Webster

Its ecological concerns, nuance and occasional lyricism place it squarely within the Ghibli oeuvre but not among its masterpieces.