This seems extremely in-depth.

lazar wrote:

wow! this is in-depth. Did you do this as some kind of project?

no, I'm just masochistic, and obsessive. to be honest, it started because I was trying to make sure I understand every line of dialogue in the movie, because I was going through it line by line (via the subtitles in the Japanese version of the DVD).

It's part of the "Extensive reading" project :-)

I've not seen the film (I've been trying to go through the Studio Ghibli films but have been going backwards from the newest ones), so I only read the first few paragraphs, but I do have a couple of comments:

メイ：うん。トトロって　ちゃんと　いったもん。けがわえて　こんなくちしてて、こんなのと、こんくらいのと、こんなに　おおきいのがねてだ

Those two bits seem off to me.

けがわえて＝毛が生えて（けがはえて）
ねてだ＝寝てた（ねてた）

The only time I feel メイ's speech may be out of character is when she said 「おとうさん　先生　お話してる。」 ("Father is talking to the doctor.") which is grammatically quite complex (お話してる requires converting a verb into a noun, attaching a honorific, then reconverting it into a progressive "doing" verb).

Like with お願いする.　お待ちする, etc? If so, you'd need to have an extra し after 話 to show it's from 話す, お話ししてる.

Although, could it be お話（を）してる (お話 the word/noun), rather than お話しする？ I've not seen the film so I don't really know the context behind the line (like who she's talking to), but it seems odd to me to have something rather formal like お話し, only to be followed up by the casual してる. I guess the character being a child could explain it, though.

Fascinating article! Only question...

The film then briefly shows an imaginary scene (the girls imagine the ススワタリ clustering in the attic, surrounding the good luck charm that is attached to the house):

I don't recall ever seeing that scene! Is it absent from certain editions?

Interesting ramble - especially the idea of stories having soul. Does that only pertain to children's stories? And I'm curious - do some young women ever use the おー　to sound　more 'kawaii'? It would seem to match a certain fashion and body language. (barf)

元年 is the first year.

お is attached to a heapload of words, just today I heard for the first time おソース which took me aback. I hadn't heard it described this way before and the attachment of an お to a katakana word seems unique. has anyone heard of お being attached in this way to any other katakana word?