Spirited Away
Directed by Hayao Miyazaki
Review by : Matt McConnel
Formality first: Five out of five, see this movie, see this
movie, and oh yes, see this movie.
Miyazaki
has made some interesting movies in his time, not least among
them being Princess Mononoke, Kiki's Delivery Service, and
My Neighbor Totoro. In all of these, certain hallmarks of
Miyazaki's work can be identified: Environmental consciousness,
solid story telling, and a desire to transport the viewer
and immerse them in a world entirely of the cinema. This last
aspect is especially strong in Miyazaki's latest and apparently
final offering to the world, Spirited Away.
The story
concerns a young girl Chihiro, a regular Alice headed straight
down a rabbit hole, who accidentally wanders into an apparently
abandoned amusement park with her parents. They become trapped
as night falls, and her parents turn into pigs from gorging
themselves on the succulent food that has been left out during
the day. Chihiro encounters Haku who helps hide her and find
her work in the bath house run by the sorcerers Yubaba who
takes her name and gives her the name of Sen. Then things
begin to get interesting. Chihiro must not only discover how
to live in this new world, but discover how to return herself
and her parents back to the world of the humans.
Unlike
the much darker previous offering from Miyazaki's Princess
Mononoke, but it was the relative success of this film in
art houses that prompted Walt Disney to go full on for the
American release of Spirited Away. Entrusting production to
Pixar's John Lasster, Disney drove full ahead with production
bringing the English language out a little over a year after
the Japanese release. Using not only well known names for
the production, such as Daveigh Chase of Lilo and Stitch fame,
but also relative outsiders to the business, the voice cast
comes together very well. Chase is wonderful as Chihiro, and
let it be hoped that this young actress has many projects
ahead of her both on screen, and behind a microphone. The
entire voice cast comes together nicely, while not having
the name weight that Princess Mononoke had; much of the cast
seems to have been drawn from Disney's pool as well as among
other voice specialized actors.
The art
is spectacular. Every scene is a feast of textures, depth,
and color; there is little use of negative space in the compositions,
and even when there is, there is variance such as clouds or
waves to draw the eye to and fro. While the overall character
designs remain Miyazaki's, there is a marked difference in
some of the scenes. While in some scenes the characters move
in such a way, and in others they do not, and while this does
not detract from the movie as a whole, it does bear note.
It seems very apparent that Miyazaki is in fact retiring with
this movie, and was in a more supervisiory capacity.
Unfortunately,
the dark cloud on this horizon is that Disney will truly kill
this movie if they leave it in the art houses like it did
with Mononoke. There has been ample marketing, or at least
more this time around, but the fact that this movie would
do relatively well in general release is something that will
have to be proven on the art house circuit first. Despite
this, Disney feels no qualms about putting their name to this
picture, as they were with Princess Mononoke. The violence
and rather less than subtle use of it did not fit the Disney
name; Spirited Away however, is very much in their vein, and
they would do well to watch and learn. The use of so many
stories in one integrated whole that is so different from
what Disney has geared itself since Snow White, that while
it would take a major paradigm shift, it would certainly net
some more interesting original ideas such as Lilo and Stitch,
and not (shudder) Oliver and Company.
This is
the sort of movie that you come out of the theater and have
to just stand there to make sure it has really ended. While
the film is long, it stops almost abruptly, though I can not
imagine ending it anywhere else. The sense of immersion in
the alien is so omnipresent that you really do feel like you
have been swept along with Chihiro. The weakness is the weakness
with a lot of Miyazaki's movies, that is to say that he takes
so much time with story and development of the characters
and world, that sometimes he leaves us behind. His tendency
in more recent years to use some of his movies as a soap box
from which to preach is left at the door thankfully, and what
we are given is a masterful journey into a Wonderland that
will delight, awe, and inspire everyone.
|
