his mother) and become quick friends. The ringmaster gives Mimiko and her family tickets to the show, but on the way home, a nasty storm breaks out. Overnight, it floods most of the land around Mimiko's hometown. A frantic cry of help from Tiny (in the form of a makeshift bottled message) sends Mimiko and her family in a search for him. They learn from the ringmaster that the train has all the animals, and it's stuck out in the middle of nowhere. Mimiko and her family go to free the animals, which they succeed in doing, but unintentionally cause the train to start (due to the playful antics of Panny and Tiny). The train goes off the rails, and ends up in a collision course with the mayor's house. However, PapaPanda stops the train, and Mimiko and her family become town heroes. The movie concludes with Mimiko and her panda family enjoying a day at the circus and later marching at home in a line while blowing brass horns (PapaPanda plays a tuba, Mimiko plays a french horn and Panny plays a trumpet that was broken earlier and somehow fixed later on). Production In 1971, Takahata, Miyazaki and Kotabe left the Toei Animation studio to join their fellow animator and mentor Otsuka at the A Productions studio, in hopes of creating an animated series based on Astrid Lindgren's Pippi Longstocking. After extensive pre-production work, the trio travelled to Sweden to seek permission from Lindgren; their request was flatly refused. Rejected, Takahata and Miyazaki joined Otsuka on the Lupin III Part I TV series as the "A-Pro directors team." After Lupin's cancellation in 1972, the team revisited the Pippi Longstocking project, and reworked many of its ideas and story elements into the theatrical short film, Panda Kopanda. The movie, as well as its followup, Rainy Day Circus, played as the opening short to Toho's Godzilla movies, where it was warmly received by audiences. Animator Yoshifumi Kondo, who also worked on Lupin the 3rd, served as a key animator on the two panda films, most notably a scene in Rainy Day Circus where Mimi and the pandas ride a bed across a flooded river. Kondo would play a valuable role in many later Takahata and Miyazaki films, including Anne of Green Gables, Grave of the Fireflies, and Whisper of the Heart. Quotes and influences The Panda Kopanda films, like all the