It was produced by Studio Ghibli for Nippon Television Network, Dentsu, Hakuhodo DYMP, Walt Disney Japan, Mitsubishi, Toho and KDDI.

The film's ensemble voice cast featured Aki Asakura, Kengo Kora, Takeo Chii, Nobuko Miyamoto, Atsuko Takahata, Tomoko Tabata, Tatekawa Shinosuke, Takaya Kamikawa, Hikaru Ijūin, Ryudo Uzaki, Nakamura Shichinosuke II, Isao Hashizume, Yukiji Asaoka (in a special appearance) and Tatsuya Nakadai.

The bamboo cutter holds a celebration, where Kaguya overhears partygoers ridiculing his attempts to turn a peasant girl into a noble through money.

Kaguya flees the capital in despair and runs back to the mountains, seeking Sutemaru and her friends, but discovers that they have all moved away.

Kaguya expresses her attachment to Earth and her reluctance to leave; the bamboo cutter swears to protect her and begins turning the mansion into a fortress.

[15] After rereading the tale, he realized the story's potential to be entertaining, as long as an adaptation allowed the audience to understand how Princess Kaguya felt.

[18] The Tale of the Princess Kaguya was financed by Nippon TV, whose late chairman, Seiichiro Ujiie, gave ¥5 billion (approximately $40 million) towards the project.

[21] To make sure the audience emotionally connected with the film, it was important to Takahata that viewers were able to "imagine or recall the reality deep within the drawings", rather than be distracted by a realistic art style.

[23] To assist with this vision, Osamu Tanabe provided the character designs and animation, and Kazuo Oga drew the watercolor backgrounds.

[19] The release of The Tale of the Princess Kaguya was finally confirmed by Studio Ghibli and distributor Toho on 13 December 2012.

Evidence of them is when Princess Kaguya and her adoptive parents moved to the capital city in order to find her a husband befitting her royal status.

Moreover, the scene where she sets her suitors impossible tasks shows the fierce determination of a woman in a world dominated by hierarchy and men.

The style of soft lines and muted hues express the simplicity of life in rural Japan where Princess Kaguya finds joy around friends and family.

There, Kaguya finds herself full of luxury and wealth, but she is also shown as caged and isolated and in many scenes the film shows how much she misses the simple rural life.

This is represented in the scene where Princess Kaguya escapes from the palace searching for freedom, where Takahata uses spontaneous brush strokes abandoning the carefully drawn charcoal lines.

This represents her feeling of being constricted and trapped, the self-awareness of her isolation, and surrender to the loss of the happy simple life she once had.

Her mother's mission, on the other hand, is to accompany her daughter in silence, to listen, to reproduce the home the princess misses so much in the palace's kitchen, where she hides and seeks peace.

[33] However, in February 2013, distributor Toho announced that the release of The Princess Kaguya would be delayed to 23 November 2013, citing concerns that the storyboards were not yet complete.

[34][35] On 12 March 2014, independent distributor GKIDS announced that it had acquired the US rights for the film and that it would release an English dub version produced by Studio Ghibli and Frank Marshall.

In North America, the film was released on DVD, Blu-ray and digital download by Universal Pictures Home Entertainment on 17 February 2015.

The critics' consensus says, "Boasting narrative depth, frank honesty, and exquisite visual beauty, The Tale of the Princess Kaguya is a modern animated treasure with timeless appeal.

[58][failed verification] Metacritic, which uses a weighted average, has assigned the film a score of 89 out of 100 based on reviews from 28 critics, indicating "universal acclaim".

[59] In February 2014, The Tale of the Princess Kaguya placed 4th in both Kinema Junpo's Best Ten and their Reader's Choice Awards.

Club gave the film an A, deeming it "the best animated movie of the year," adding that it is "destined to be remembered as one of the revered Studio Ghibli's finest achievements.

"[61] Nicolas Rapold of The New York Times praised the artwork calling it "exquisitely drawn with both watercolor delicacy and a brisk sense of line.

"[62] For IndieWire's 2018 list of the best Japanese films of the 21st century, Carlos Aguilar expressed agreement with the common view that Spirited Away is the greatest, but still chose The Tale of the Princess Kaguya for the list and referred to the latter as "a work of nearly identical caliber [...] an artistic triumph that delights with exuberant handcraft where the each pencil stroke comes alive on screen.