The film stars the voices of Sumi Shimamoto, Gorō Naya, Yōji Matsuda, Yoshiko Sakakibara, and Iemasa Kayumi.

[1] Set in a post-nuclear futuristic world, it tells the story of Nausicaä (Shimamoto), the pacifist teenage princess of the Valley of the Wind who becomes embroiled in a struggle with Tolmekia, an empire that attempts to use an ancient weapon to eradicate a jungle populated by oversized, mutant insects.

[3] A heavily edited version of the film created by Manson International, Warriors of the Wind, was released in the United States and other markets throughout the mid-to-late 1980s.

One thousand years have passed since the Seven Days of Fire, an apocalyptic war that destroyed civilization and caused an ecocide, creating the vast Toxic Jungle,[a] a poisonous forest swarming with giant mutant insects.

[4] In the kingdom of the Valley of the Wind, a prophecy predicts a savior "clothed in a blue robe, descending onto a golden field".

The Valley's princess Nausicaä explores the jungle and communicates with its creatures, including the gigantic, trilobite-like armored Ohm.

One morning, a massive cargo aircraft from the militaristic Empire of Tolmekia crashes in the Valley despite Nausicaä's efforts to save it.

She leaves to rescue the interceptor's pilot, who turns out to be Princess Lastelle's twin brother, Asbel, but both crash through a stratum of quicksand into a non-toxic area below the Toxic Jungle.

[11] In the early stages, Isao Takahata, credited as executive producer, reluctantly joined the project even before the animation studio was chosen.

[12] The production studio's work was known to both Miyazaki and Takahata and was chosen because its artistic talent could transpose the sophisticated atmosphere of the manga to the film.

[12][13] One notable animator was Hideaki Anno, a founding member of Gainax, who among later works wrote and directed Neon Genesis Evangelion.

Anno was assigned to draw the challenging Giant Warrior's attack sequence, which according to Toshio Suzuki is a "high point in the film".

Nausicaä, in addition to being a transformative force, leads people to understand and respect nature, which is portrayed as welcoming, spiritual, and restorative for those who enter it peacefully.

[22] Ian DeWeese-Boyd agrees, "Her commitment to love and understanding—even to the point of death—transforms the very nature of the conflict around her and begins to dispel the distorting visions that have brought it about.

The VHS was reissued as the third volume of Buena Vista Home Entertainment Japan's "Ghibli ga Ippai" imprint, on 19 September 1997.

[36][37] The voice actors were not credited, and the film was heavily cut by approximately 22 minutes compared to the 117-minute Japanese version to give it a faster pace.

[6] Consequently, part of the film's narrative depth was lost: some of the environmentalist themes were simplified as was the main subplot of the Ohmu, omitting Nausicaä's childhood connection to them.

[40][41] Dissatisfied with Warriors of the Wind, Miyazaki eventually adopted a strict "no-edits" clause for further foreign releases of the company's films.

[47] The film was released on Blu-ray in the United States and Canada on 8 March 2011, by Walt Disney Studios Home Entertainment.

[28] In Italy the film, titled Nausica nella Valle del vento ('Nausicaä in the Valley of the Wind'), was first aired uncut on Rai 1 on 6 January 1987 with a first dub, but this version was re-aired only a few times and then never officially published;[53] a planned DVD release around 2003 by Buena Vista Italia was eventually cancelled.

In a contemporary review of the initial American release, Terry Lawson of Dayton Daily News applauded the film for its character designs and allegorical themes, as well as Hayao Miyazaki's direction and Joe Hisaishi's score.

[63] Sega's Yukio Futatsugi has cited the film an inspiration for his 1995 rail shooter Panzer Dragoon, as he was an avid fan of Miyazaki's work.

Numerous games have used Ohmu-like creatures assumed to be references to the film, including Metal Slug 3, Cyber Core, and Viewpoint.

[64] The game Crystalis, known in Japan as God Slayer: Haruka Tenkū no Sonata (ゴッド・スレイヤー はるか天空のソナタ), shares common elements with the film, including an insect that resembles an Ohmu.

[66] Manga author Katsura Hoshino regarded it as her favorite anime film to the point of having watched it multiple times when she was young.

[68] It was the highest-ranking film in a 2006 poll of the greatest animations conducted at the Japan Media Arts Festival, voted by 80,000 attendees.

According to the accompanying film book released in Japan, the glider is called Möwe (メーヴェ, Mēve, or "mehve" in the English manga), the German word meaning gull.

Two full-size gliders with no power source carrying the code name M01 and M02, with a half-sized jet-powered remote-controlled mock-up called moewe 1/2, were built.

[79] Miyazaki's manga version of Nausicaä was written over a period of 12 years, with breaks taken to work on Studio Ghibli films.

[91][92] In 2001, the Nausicaä storyboards were re-released, bundled into a single, larger, volume as part 1 of the Studio Ghibli Story boards collection.