‘I cannot stress enough how much I enjoyed Spirited Away – so gloriously bizarre yet so completely feasible in its own terms! Like Alice in Wonderland on a considerably greater scale, the characters, setpieces and concepts showed an astounding creativity, and the madness contrasts so well with the epic Mononoke-hime. The characters were wonderful – if we were to imagine Sen/Chihiro to have been acted by a real person, that little girl would be a sublime mime artist; Haku was so beautiful in the way all Miyazaki’s youths are beautiful; Yubaba was such an awesome presence when filling the screen, like some twisted Margaret Thatcher caricature…and all the sweet minor characters were brilliantly conceived. If Jeunet chose to direct a Disney film, he couldn’t hope for better results. And I needn’t mention the Freudian implications abounding throughout the film – riding on a serpent god indeed!’
Those were my impressions almost a decade ago, on October 24, 2002, shortly before Ghibli’s popularity exploded over around the world and certainly before I had much experience of the studio’s work. But even now, it’s one of my favourite animated films of all time, so full of flights of the imagination, superlative imagery and even subtle touches: how many of us notice that tiny glint of a hairband that indicates that the whole thing truly did happen and wasn’t just a dream at the end on a first viewing? I know I didn’t.
To date Sen to Chihiro no Kamikakushi is the only anime film to win the Best Animation Oscar, although perhaps it is notable that it was in a year no Pixar film was nominated. It brought Ghibli to a much larger audience and with Mononoke-hime, represents the pinnacle of Miyazaki’s filmmaking. Yes, I love Totoro, but the scale, tone and technical qualities of those two films, especially complementing and contrasting one another, are in my esteem amongst the greatest achievements of any director. Much as I think Takahata is the greater maker in that particular partnership, he has yet to produce two great films in such close proximity.
No comments:
Post a Comment