The difference between a good movie like Howl’s Moving Castle and a good movie like Spirited Away is the immediateness or abstractness of their theses.

HMC: Love transcends time
SA: Maturity cools adversity

Both are valid, one you just have to carve for a little to pinpoint.

It doesn’t necessarily make one message “better” than the other or raise one movie over the other. One is direct and the other subdued. Both are good for different reasons. If you value one over another and can express why, bravo. You’re a better critic than 99% of the internet.

Your criticism is an argument for your subjective experience with an objective work. Be careful not to blur the distinction between objective quality and subjective preference. That’s the stumbling block for most in the critical circles. They confuse their tastes for truths.

Be able to explain where, when, and why you value your subjective interpretation over the objective quality.
That’s the trick.
Do that and nobody can hold your tastes against you. Well, they CAN but if they still try, they’re the obnoxious ones now.

Wow. This thread became a rambling, preachy mess. Thanks for putting up with my silly musings. Or if you ignore them, God bless anyway.