Hayao Miyazaki's debut as a film director is assured, original, and very funny. The Castle Of Cagliostro is a cool, classy caper that respected Monkey Punch's original material, but Miyazaki still made it his own. With the help of Yasuo Otsuka, the giant of the anime industry who had been his mentor in his early career at Toei, Miyazaki takes elements from the original novels that inspired Monkey Punch, American and European films from Chaplin to Bond, and blends them into a superbly paced and beautifully shot picture. Yuji Ono, the Lupin III house composer and one of Japan's most beloved jazzmen, provides a score that mixes funkadelia and orchestral themes with true panache. If you need more evidence for the brilliance of Miyazaki's creation that the film itself, look at the way it's been mined for inspiration by other animators, most notably Disney, in The Great Mouse Detective (1986). Miyazaki tones down Lupin's usual lascivious and mercenary interests for this adventure, but he seldom lets the action flag.