I think the beauty of Miyazaki films is that they are like epic tales that unfold, with a grand and greater world containing greater problems within that originate from these (tiny in comparison in to the world) beings living in the world interacting with each other with great purpose and sometimes not.

I'm not so much a Miyazaki fan as it is a part of my life, I grew up in Japan so Totoro is like Micky, but even more to me. Its almost an abstract existence thats un-copyrightable like Uncle Sam or a Greek God, if you will. Which I know sounds silly since Totoro is clearly copyrighted and is no way as historical as a Greek God nor as important, of course. But what I mean by that is that Totoro is a representation of animistic world views, which is why the character talks so deeply to me as I am by virtue of my upbringing an animist not by belief but rather by perspective. In animism, the spirits of nature and the world being actually real or not are not as important as personifying the unseeable and trying see the connection between objects, people and objects, the natural world and people, or amongst the natural world and more.

In Miyazaki films, the atmosphere being created is fairly important too. The concept of creating a world that is believable with purpose (amongst the characters within it) is sometimes much more important to Ghibli Studio than to try to convey a narrative with an ultimate message with a strict purpose with a punch line or a "main message")

I hate to sound like I'm criticizing South Park since South Park is a lot of fun for me (my first introduction into American humor and sarcasm) but South Park is full of 'useless' jokes (I put useless only in quotes because obviously the purpose of the jokes are the jokes themselves, but to someone like me who originally didn't understand the jokes, a lot of them didn't seem to add or contribute to the main story arc in many episodes even without understanding them) South Park then has a final theme to end things on.

In Japanese films and somewhat Ghibli, there is less clear purpose. Unlike western film, primarily American, there is a sense of beginning middle and end. In Japanese films traditionally, it is more conceptual and sometimes abstract, despite obviously sharing the same structure of needing a beginning middle and end. But these arches are not always wrapped up as neatly as in the west.

The only example in the west I can come up of which is similar is the ending to traditional Japanese films is "The Birds" from Alfred Hitchcock. Its the perfect ending to the movie, and the movie has in a way, no point other than to convey its story. This can be unsettling to modern viewers who have unfortunately or fortunately been trained to think and expect certain information during movies. So you show a movie without context and all of a sudden it is a very jarring experience.

I think at the end of the day, you can enjoy Ghibli films much like a western movie as a whole. There is a clear defined ending and there is a start. The way it progresses throughout may not be the same as a western film but I do think that it is all organic.

Life is organically (not lifeforms organic but the "forming an integral element of a whole" definition) evolving constantly and Ghibli tries to capture this inherent randomness that is life. I think he tries to capture a lot of that.

Whether its the Totoro family having a mother who is ill, the Spirited Away girl who must make her way through a mysterious circumstance without her parents, Porco Rosso who just became a pig during WWI, Nausicca who loves the world despite it being poisoned but finds her remaining virgin valley being overtaken by unwanted belligerents, a big theme is that these are people fighting for what they want in adverse circumstances and I think that is a part of film that anybody can appreciate regardless of their background.