Hayao Miyazaki first wrote to author Ursula K. Le Guin about adapting her book into a film. LeGuin at the time was unfamiliar with Miyazaki's work, and associated animation to be similar to Disney animation, and turned the offer down. After she saw My Neighbor Totoro (1988), she loved it, and decided to allow the movie to be made.
Hayao Miyazaki wanted to direct the film, but was busy filming Howl's Moving Castle (2004) at the time. Producer Toshio Suzuki chose Gorô Miyazaki to direct, since he was impressed by Goro's talent of making decisions quickly and properly while working in the Ghibli Museum, and his ability to draw pictures. Hayao was against Goro directing, and production was very tense.
Ursula K. Le Guin was disappointed in the adaptation of her book. She released a statement on her blog, noting that she found it "beautiful" and "exciting" yet the "imagery is often conventional" and "the excitement was maintained by violence, to a degree that I find deeply untrue to the spirit of the books." She further stated "in the film, evil has been comfortably externalized in a villain who can simply be killed, thus solving all problems. In modern fantasy, killing people is the usual solution to the so-called war between good and evil. My books are not conceived in terms of such a war, and offer no simple answers to simplistic questions."
Initially, "Earthsea" author Ursula K. Le Guin wanted Hayao Miyazaki to direct the film. At the time, however, the elder Miyazaki was tied up working on Howl's Moving Castle (2004), and thus could not come on-board at the right time. Not wanting to pass up the opportunity to make the film, Miyazaki's son Gorô Miyazaki stepped up to the plate and decided to make this his first film.
Despite the movie being property of Japan's Studio Ghibli, it marks the first Disney (produced or distributed) animated film to receive a PG-13 rating.