10 Great Anime Films Of The 21st Century (That Aren't Studio Ghibli)

Filmmaker Mamoru Hosoda could have had any number of his films on this list, from the brilliant sci-fi of Summer Wars through the familial fantasy of Wolf Children, to the action-adventure of The Boy and the Beast and his most recent feature Mirai - the only non-Ghibli film to earn an Academy Award for Best Animated Feature nomination. Ever since he broke onto the scene in charge of the first Digimon movie of all things, the 52-year-old has arguably proved to be in a class of his own.

But it's his breakout independent feature from 2005 that perhaps remains the auteur's most affectionately held; a loose sequel to the 1967 novel of the same name, with which it shares the premise of a young high-school student who suddenly finds herself with the power to travel in time. The girl in question, Makoto Konno, initially revels in the newfound freedom to literally leap to a different point of existence - but soon, she comes to reckon with the consequences of her actions.

As a neat riff on the coming-of-age formula, it's a particularly enchanting affair, one that is just as content to revel in the summer solaces it unfolds under as anything else. Hosoda has proved himself a master of mood no matter the genre, but he arguably perfected that thoughtful sensibility here a decade and a half ago, which gives it the slight edge overall.