Studio Ghibli are the greatest animation studio working at the moment. Even Pixar doesn’t come close in terms of their astonishing consistency. They only have one real stinker – the high school drama Ocean Waves, and even that isn’t as bad as Cars 2 – and even their less impressive films have much that impresses. A few of their films, however, are only really there for aficionados of the studio, and The Cat Returns is one of them. A sequel in the loosest sense of the word to the stunning Whisper of the Heart, The Cat Returns is a strange fantasy about a girl who enters a land populated entirely by anthropomorphic cats – one of whom she slightly falls for as she slowly becomes feline herself. It’s got a lot of the hallmarks of some anime that never crossed over to Western audiences in the same way as other Ghiblis or Akira have. It’s just a little too weird for most tastes.

There’s lots to love about The Cat Returns, not least of which is the sheer invention that bursts from every frame of the film. To enter the world of cats is to take a dizzying trip into your strangest fever dreams, with increasing levels of uncomfortableness. Not only that, but the animation is as stunning as you have come to expect from the house that Totoro built, and looks particularly stunning on Blu-Ray. The Wonderland-like feel of the film has cemented this as a studio favourite for a few furries and feline-fans out there, but for most Ghibli fans this is second-tier stuff. The lead character is their least engaging heroine, which is particularly disappointing for a studio famed for its strong, independent women. The romantic strand that runs throughout the film, meanwhile, is just plain weird. Yet even sub-par Ghibli is better than most of the dross pumped out of bigger studios, and fans of Spirited Away and My Neighbour Totoro will undoubtedly find much to enjoy here.

The Cat Returns is out on Blu-Ray now.