It is to my lasting regret that I've only seen SPIRITED AWAY once, on a shitty fansub VCD I bought on eBay because I couldn't wait for the official translation. It was beautiful, but the bad subtitles made it completely incomprehensible, to the point where nothing in this piece made any sense to me, because I watched a different, wrong version of the movie. One day I will fix this.
Are you saving a general overview of Miyazaki’s work for MY NEIGHBOR TOTORO? Because one thing that struck me about THE BOY AND THE HERON was how much it had echoes of this (and other Miyazaki films, to a lesser extent).
This is my favorite film. My parents also introduced Miyazaki to me at a young age and I became a bit obsessed with his work and Ghibli as a whole.
I’ve always seen Spirited Away as a coming of age film but it’s interesting to think about it as more of a revealing rather than a maturing. You certainly spend a lot of the movie in the moment with Chihiro and she doesn’t have a lot of time for self reflection, she’s gotta keep moving forward. Spirited Away is far from the kind of non-stop thrill ride that say, Fury Road is, but I think what makes the train scene stand out is that it’s a moment of calm, where the viewer and the character can reflect on everything that’s happened.
All I know is that at some point the girl complaining about not getting a goodbye bouquet in the beginning is gone and the one who can confidently stand up to witches and No Faces has taken her place. The dub even makes a point of highlighting how comparatively trivial her concerns at the beginning seem when at the end the dad asks her if she’s still worried about going to a new school. Was shocked when I finally watched the sub and realized that line was added to the English version. Maybe the coming of age angle wasn’t Miyazaki’s explicit intention then and the English language writers felt there needed to be some kind of button that could put the film into a more recognizable arc.
That's fascinating to think about. I watched the subtitled version this time, but have seen it both ways. (Obviously, my kids took to the dub, given that they couldn't read or speak Japanese.) It never occurred to me that there might be significant differences to the two versions beyond the translation.
I'll also note that this is one of our shorter conversations for S&S. Part of that is that we have MY NEIGHBOR TOTORO coming very soon, given how closely the two landed in the poll. But I think so much about the film is magical and experiential and hard to put into words.
There's a couple of other English lines added in here and there, but I think the addition at the end is the most significant one. I'm generally a purist when it comes to this, but honestly I don't think it was a bad idea to have the film end with Chihiro having the last word.
Some of the other movies have little changes. In the English dub of Monokoke, Ashitaka is leaving his sister behind, but in Japanese, she's a love interest.
Thanks to it streaming on HBO, this is probably the animated film I've seen the most. Not only is it beautiful, but it's pretty funny as well. It also has way more vomiting than you would expect from the genre. I think Miyazaki must have owned a dog at some point, because the scene of Chihiro giving dragon Haku the emetic dumpling is a decent representation of trying to pill a dog.
So your mention of losing the sequential thread made me think of a comparison that seems so obvious (to me anyway) that I can’t believe it never occurred to me before.
One of the effects that this movie always has on me is a kind of suspension of time. 20 minute segments where it seems I’ve been immersed for an hour. The other artist who makes me experience this is David Lynch, especially in Twin Peaks: The Return. There were episodes that made me check the time because I must have been watching for over an hour, and it had been less than 30 minutes. Something of the same thing that dreams do.
Totoro was also my son’s favorite, but this was a close second. I initially worried Spirited might be too dark at the age when he saw it, but mommy and daddy turning into pigs was Randall Jr’s favorite part of the movie at age 5. I think there’s no age too young for dream logic, it’s the air that children breathe, though some of us may unfortunately become so wedded to the world as we know it, so mature, that dream logic in film is wasted on us.
Anyone else get choked up at the ending of Spirited Away like I do? I'm actually perplexed by my reaction. Chihiro wins. She rescues her parents. She sets the other world right. She survives every challenge physical, spiritual, and intellectual. There are no dragons slain in this quest, monsters are reformed. Yet the ending isn't a celebration, it's a profound melancholy.
I think part of what registers is that the ending closes the door to a fantastical world not just on Chihiro but us in the audience too. She'll never get back to a place that can go blow-for-blow with even the most wildest child's imagination, and we can only revisit it.
This is one of my favorite films, and for a while I was embarrassed to say that, because it's an animated film. No longer though! Absolutely a banger.
What strikes me is how kind so many characters are in this film (and Ghibli writ large). Somewhere in the vast cinemascape of wisecracking animals and Whedonistic superheroes lies a peaceful oasis that is Miyazaki and Takahata's oeuvre. It's full of characters like Lin, who swipes some buns for Chihiro, comforts her as she cries and encourages her as she makes her trip to the train station. Kamajī can't give Chihiro a job, but bribes Lin to help her, places a blanket on her when she falls asleep in the boiler room, and gives her his train tickets which he's saved for 40 years (!!). And of course, there's Chihiro herself, and the boy-dragon who once saved her life.
It's that kindness that's permeated my thinking about this film ever since I saw it as an 11-year-old. I really do love it.
I really love this, my oldest is 7 now (and a huge Totoro fan) so it might be nearly time. I find myself thinking about it every time I'm watching a big budget action movie and it keeps escalating with BIGGER EXPLOSIONS and LOUDER NOISES but it's nowhere as enthralling as the climax of this with the protagonist sitting quietly on a train going across some water. It's been years since I've seen it but my brain tells me that sequence goes on for like 20 minutes.
My very first Miyazaki. In fact, the first time I'd even *heard* of the man was when Toonami was running their Month of Miyazaki and I saw the trailer for this; my brothers and I watched it there during Friday Dinner Night and we got on a small kick at Blockbuster afterwards in which we saw Castle In the Sky, This, and Howl's Moving Castle a ton. There's a lot of his work I haven't seen but this is still gonna be the one for me. It's a beautiful movie, full of character and detail, firmly unique in its emotional spectrum. Iconic for a reason.
It is to my lasting regret that I've only seen SPIRITED AWAY once, on a shitty fansub VCD I bought on eBay because I couldn't wait for the official translation. It was beautiful, but the bad subtitles made it completely incomprehensible, to the point where nothing in this piece made any sense to me, because I watched a different, wrong version of the movie. One day I will fix this.
Are you saving a general overview of Miyazaki’s work for MY NEIGHBOR TOTORO? Because one thing that struck me about THE BOY AND THE HERON was how much it had echoes of this (and other Miyazaki films, to a lesser extent).
This is my favorite film. My parents also introduced Miyazaki to me at a young age and I became a bit obsessed with his work and Ghibli as a whole.
I’ve always seen Spirited Away as a coming of age film but it’s interesting to think about it as more of a revealing rather than a maturing. You certainly spend a lot of the movie in the moment with Chihiro and she doesn’t have a lot of time for self reflection, she’s gotta keep moving forward. Spirited Away is far from the kind of non-stop thrill ride that say, Fury Road is, but I think what makes the train scene stand out is that it’s a moment of calm, where the viewer and the character can reflect on everything that’s happened.
All I know is that at some point the girl complaining about not getting a goodbye bouquet in the beginning is gone and the one who can confidently stand up to witches and No Faces has taken her place. The dub even makes a point of highlighting how comparatively trivial her concerns at the beginning seem when at the end the dad asks her if she’s still worried about going to a new school. Was shocked when I finally watched the sub and realized that line was added to the English version. Maybe the coming of age angle wasn’t Miyazaki’s explicit intention then and the English language writers felt there needed to be some kind of button that could put the film into a more recognizable arc.
That's fascinating to think about. I watched the subtitled version this time, but have seen it both ways. (Obviously, my kids took to the dub, given that they couldn't read or speak Japanese.) It never occurred to me that there might be significant differences to the two versions beyond the translation.
I'll also note that this is one of our shorter conversations for S&S. Part of that is that we have MY NEIGHBOR TOTORO coming very soon, given how closely the two landed in the poll. But I think so much about the film is magical and experiential and hard to put into words.
There's a couple of other English lines added in here and there, but I think the addition at the end is the most significant one. I'm generally a purist when it comes to this, but honestly I don't think it was a bad idea to have the film end with Chihiro having the last word.
It's kind of clumsy and got me thinking about how it would work applied to other films.
[warehouse worker] "Guess they'll never find the Lost Ark now!"
[off screen police officer] "That guy sure is psycho, ain't he?"
Etc.
Some of the other movies have little changes. In the English dub of Monokoke, Ashitaka is leaving his sister behind, but in Japanese, she's a love interest.
Thanks to it streaming on HBO, this is probably the animated film I've seen the most. Not only is it beautiful, but it's pretty funny as well. It also has way more vomiting than you would expect from the genre. I think Miyazaki must have owned a dog at some point, because the scene of Chihiro giving dragon Haku the emetic dumpling is a decent representation of trying to pill a dog.
Amateur hour. If I'm Chihiro, I'm tucking that emetic dumpling into Haku's food.
This may work with a dog, or even Haku, but try that nonsense with a cat.
So your mention of losing the sequential thread made me think of a comparison that seems so obvious (to me anyway) that I can’t believe it never occurred to me before.
One of the effects that this movie always has on me is a kind of suspension of time. 20 minute segments where it seems I’ve been immersed for an hour. The other artist who makes me experience this is David Lynch, especially in Twin Peaks: The Return. There were episodes that made me check the time because I must have been watching for over an hour, and it had been less than 30 minutes. Something of the same thing that dreams do.
Totoro was also my son’s favorite, but this was a close second. I initially worried Spirited might be too dark at the age when he saw it, but mommy and daddy turning into pigs was Randall Jr’s favorite part of the movie at age 5. I think there’s no age too young for dream logic, it’s the air that children breathe, though some of us may unfortunately become so wedded to the world as we know it, so mature, that dream logic in film is wasted on us.
Anyone else get choked up at the ending of Spirited Away like I do? I'm actually perplexed by my reaction. Chihiro wins. She rescues her parents. She sets the other world right. She survives every challenge physical, spiritual, and intellectual. There are no dragons slain in this quest, monsters are reformed. Yet the ending isn't a celebration, it's a profound melancholy.
I think part of what registers is that the ending closes the door to a fantastical world not just on Chihiro but us in the audience too. She'll never get back to a place that can go blow-for-blow with even the most wildest child's imagination, and we can only revisit it.
This is one of my favorite films, and for a while I was embarrassed to say that, because it's an animated film. No longer though! Absolutely a banger.
What strikes me is how kind so many characters are in this film (and Ghibli writ large). Somewhere in the vast cinemascape of wisecracking animals and Whedonistic superheroes lies a peaceful oasis that is Miyazaki and Takahata's oeuvre. It's full of characters like Lin, who swipes some buns for Chihiro, comforts her as she cries and encourages her as she makes her trip to the train station. Kamajī can't give Chihiro a job, but bribes Lin to help her, places a blanket on her when she falls asleep in the boiler room, and gives her his train tickets which he's saved for 40 years (!!). And of course, there's Chihiro herself, and the boy-dragon who once saved her life.
It's that kindness that's permeated my thinking about this film ever since I saw it as an 11-year-old. I really do love it.
I really love this, my oldest is 7 now (and a huge Totoro fan) so it might be nearly time. I find myself thinking about it every time I'm watching a big budget action movie and it keeps escalating with BIGGER EXPLOSIONS and LOUDER NOISES but it's nowhere as enthralling as the climax of this with the protagonist sitting quietly on a train going across some water. It's been years since I've seen it but my brain tells me that sequence goes on for like 20 minutes.
Did anyone catch the filmed version of the theatrical adaptation? It looked really cool
If we're talking about a 2000s golden age of animation, Satoshi Kon must be included.
My very first Miyazaki. In fact, the first time I'd even *heard* of the man was when Toonami was running their Month of Miyazaki and I saw the trailer for this; my brothers and I watched it there during Friday Dinner Night and we got on a small kick at Blockbuster afterwards in which we saw Castle In the Sky, This, and Howl's Moving Castle a ton. There's a lot of his work I haven't seen but this is still gonna be the one for me. It's a beautiful movie, full of character and detail, firmly unique in its emotional spectrum. Iconic for a reason.