$$ID=Hayao Miyazaki$$ looks like a kind and gentle grandfather, with his gray beard and relaxed smile. In fact, he is a grandfather, and perhaps that's why his last few films (I have yet to see his earlier work) have as a central character a young lad or lass with whom we want to persevere, set up to be the hero of their particular tribe. Sure, there's the lovable Harry Potter, whom people of all ages seem to appreciate, but he's a character set up as special from the start, so each successive difficulty falls under the tent of setting up an adulthood of importance. In pleasant contrast, Miyazaki's children are average and given progressively maturing hoops to jump through. The environments they are placed in may be fantastical, but the turmoil they must overcome is fairly commonplace. Harry Potter is a great escape, but Miyazaki is interactive, even if it is executed through animation instead of live action.No matter what familiar storytelling patterns Miyazaki follows to compose one of his films, it is consistently entertaining, endearing, and touching a truly indispensable experience for any age group or background. His latest animated masterpiece, Spirited Away, takes place in the well-defined (but not exhaustively detailed) fictional environment of a bathhouse where spirits go to refresh for a new day. They come in all night long and are given royal treatment, no matter what their shape or size, as long as they pay for the pleasure. The workers rest during the day, when the spirits are off keeping the human world together. As with &&ID=V2698-D||Name=Princess Mononoke&& and &&ID=V2698-D||Name=My Neighbor Totoro&&, Miyazaki yet again beautifully explores the difficult, and often circular, relationship of humanity within a larger natural context. One really doesn't survive without the other, which one or both learn poignantly enough after mistakes made through hubris. As Miyazaki chooses to grant equal amounts of respect to both thematic protagonists, the overall morality issues being expounded upon certainly lean towards making decisions with an eye to exterior environment instead of just selfish means, but these lessons shy from feeling heavy-handed. Young Chihiro gets caught in the spirit world when her parents accidentally gorge on the delicious food set aside for the spirits and transform into pigs. Already the younger generation is shown as sensing what their adult counterparts could not, and this pattern in Miyazaki's work of exploring the openness of innocence attaches you to his characters. A young servant to the bathhouse owner, Haku, takes pity on Chihiro and gives her instruction on finding a job until she can rescue her parents. Through a slow but meticulously engaging series of events, Chihiro grows out of her clutz-hood to gain stature in the eyes of her superiors and is given a chance to affect their cynicism with her sweetness. While you can predict that she will eventually succeed because she's the main character and a youth, how she achieves each of the gradual accomplishments is not as easily foreseen, so you are left to patiently travel and struggle with her through the entire journey. Because Miyazaki takes time to setup and maintain the hierarchy of this fantasy, a real sense of danger stays intact enough to inspire silence or nail-biting. If Chihiro forgets her name, which she has given up in her contract, she will not be able to return to her own world. If Haku is a pawn of Yubaba's, will he really help Chihiro with her parents? As an adventure story, our heroine won't be successful with every task she puts her mind to, if it's even the right thing to do at that time. And though she'll learn necessary skills through the labor, it may feel temporarily disheartening. Remembering the positive conclusions of Miyazaki's last films may not help, but the mixture of charismatic personalities around Chihiro and her admirable perseverance through the toil will. The usage of animation for such a story also keeps one visually glued to the screen far better than had this been a straight three-dimensional drama. Animated melodrama never feels as heavy as skin-twitching. But Spirited Away is also balanced with incredible charm and an emphasis on unconditional love that in anyone else's hands would probably be dismissed as corny. The growing warmth between Haku and Chihiro is priceless. Watching a small blackbird carry around a fat mouse, heaving noises included, is simply funny. Even the villainous Yubaba has a soft spot for her enormously spoiled child that provokes laugher. And what about No Face knitting? Or watching soot cling to Chihiro's unforced goodness and save her shoes for her, possibly the most adorable exchange between characters without dialogue placed in a film this year. Because life is all about balance, you have little choice but to experience hardship and fun, and accepting that truth lends enduring hope amidst those tough times. The singular complaint of Spirited Away is the consistent reminder that Chihiro doesn't care for gold, won't be bribed with it, that no matter how much everyone else loves the sight of the shiny stuff, she will shun it. As there is no such thing as a perfect film, this two minutes of repetition every once in a while is easily forgiven in the realistically innocent voice of rejection. Spirited Away may have the standard plot elements of an underdog-hero story, but the execution is so impeccably written you almost forget it has been told before. Like every good bedtime story, the classic contrivances of growing up are laid out with an exuberant imagination anyone can relate to and embrace. Review Courtesy of Rachel Gordon 2 DVD Included:
Animation Comic screen in screen capability,
Hayao Miyazaki Commentary,
Tour Of The GHIBLI
Hayao Miyazaki [Animation Intro] Book |
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