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Spirited [Anime]
italianranma
Registered User regular
Registered User regular
Sorry, (I'm not sorry) I'm going to chat about the objectively best isekai Spirited Away more.
I was lucky enough to watch it in theaters in America. What struck me at first about it was just how much stuff is in it. Why do all the female bath house employees have the high painted on eyebrows popular in the Edo era? Was there some significance in the fact that it's a radish spirit who shares the elevator with Chihiro? Why is 油 (oil) so prominent on the bathhouse merch? I was dating a Japanese girl at the time and really grilled her on all these cultural things that I had no experience with because I so desperately wanted to understand everything about this film. Spirited Away by far is Miyazaki's movie with the highest density of symbolism, but I've learned over the years that not everything shown is symbolic or even significant. And I think the train scene embodies this best:
https://youtu.be/VbRmFSQYeac
(For listening: Joe Hisaishi The Sixth Station)
This is my favorite scene in the movie, and I can't understand exactly why that is. I get a similar feeling of melancholy from the underwater Hyrule scene in The Windwaker and exploring the outskirts of Hyrule in Breath of the Wild. Your Name also does this to a certain extent, but because the cause of sadness (loss of one's significant other) is known, it can't be properly described as melancholy. There's one additional experience that I'm always reminded of: back in 2005 I fled east from Hurricane Katrina to Jacksonville Florida, and on the way back home on Highway 10 I saw more than a few streets that were completely submerged in water in a very similar way to how the train tracks are shown in Spirited Away. After watching the movie again I decided to do a little more digging to see if there was more symbolism in that scene that I was missing out on.
I said it indirectly in my last post about it, but in many ways Spirited Away is a huge thematic departure from Miyazaki's previous works which focus primarily on achieving a balance between human achievement and harmony with nature. He said in an interview;
Thematically Spirited Away is all about retaining one's identity even as one must adapt to the changing demands of the world, and specifically about doing so through adolescence. I think this is pretty well known, so I'm going to focus on that train scene because there's an elusive quality of it that relates to this theme. And for those who haven't seen it yet spoilers below:
Going into this scene we've got a few things to review: we've just finished the climax of the movie: Chihiro has through her own power rescued Haku from death, absolved Noh-Face of greed, and in doing so saved Yubaba's bathhouse from destruction. She then embarks on her next selfless act which is to return Zeniba's hanko; a hanko is a personal seal used in Japan and constitutes your signature on legally binding documents. It is extremely symbolic of one's identity, and its abduction could be seen as a kind of identity theft. To even further understand the significance of this act in Japanese culture, Chihiro is accepting the Giri (a word that can be translated as debt, but has much deeper cultural significance) of Haku's theft in order to clear his name. Her belief that Haku is not a thief and the desire to make that true overrides her indebtedness even to her parents who are still pigs. This is implicitly stated by Kamaji as he points out that tickets are extremely rare and that the train only runs in one direction. It is in this scene that Chihiro has made her first decision completely independently of others that isn't driven by necessity or circumstance.
On the train itself we see the large imposing figure of the conductor who silently and oppressively shreds her tickets as she boards the train. All the other figures here are shadowy, but unmistakably adults. Boh and the transformed bird hop excitedly at the prospect of being on a trip while Chihiro takes her place on the train stoically staring forwards, not looking back.
The scene is heavy with metaphor: this one-way journey for Chihiro is the adolescent's journey to adulthood. The shadowy figures on the train are the random disassociated strangers of adult life. The isolated landscapes separated by oceans those places we inhabit in our humdrum routine: home, work, the trainstops between them. The shadowy girl who looks to be Chihiro's age is her own self as a child, left behind in this transition.
The scene is heavy with something else, and this is what I couldn't quite put my finger on until I did the research behind it. Artists call it negative space, but the Japanese word for it is 間 (ma). When Roger Ebert told Miyazaki how he loved how motion is expressed in his movies he said, “...Instead of every movement being dictated by the story, sometimes people will just sit for a moment, or they will sigh, or look in a running stream, or do something extra. Not to advance the story, but only to give the sense of time and place and who they are.”
After Chihiro finds her place on the train and motions for Noh-face to sit beside her there is not a single word of dialogue spoken, or any action on her part (aside from looking forlorn out the window) for the next 2 minutes, not until she disembarks at Zeniba’s house. But this still speaks volumes about her character: she has gone from being a child, lounging in the back seat of her parents’ car, to being an adult taking responsibility for the three charges under her care. The carefree idleness of youth replaced by the anxious ambivalence of adulthood. I can’t take credit for this line, but it’s beautiful and I have to share it:
Of course Miyazaki isn’t the only director to use Ma & metaphor to capture the audience’s emotions. What other anime has spirited you away?
I was lucky enough to watch it in theaters in America. What struck me at first about it was just how much stuff is in it. Why do all the female bath house employees have the high painted on eyebrows popular in the Edo era? Was there some significance in the fact that it's a radish spirit who shares the elevator with Chihiro? Why is 油 (oil) so prominent on the bathhouse merch? I was dating a Japanese girl at the time and really grilled her on all these cultural things that I had no experience with because I so desperately wanted to understand everything about this film. Spirited Away by far is Miyazaki's movie with the highest density of symbolism, but I've learned over the years that not everything shown is symbolic or even significant. And I think the train scene embodies this best:
https://youtu.be/VbRmFSQYeac(For listening: Joe Hisaishi The Sixth Station)
This is my favorite scene in the movie, and I can't understand exactly why that is. I get a similar feeling of melancholy from the underwater Hyrule scene in The Windwaker and exploring the outskirts of Hyrule in Breath of the Wild. Your Name also does this to a certain extent, but because the cause of sadness (loss of one's significant other) is known, it can't be properly described as melancholy. There's one additional experience that I'm always reminded of: back in 2005 I fled east from Hurricane Katrina to Jacksonville Florida, and on the way back home on Highway 10 I saw more than a few streets that were completely submerged in water in a very similar way to how the train tracks are shown in Spirited Away. After watching the movie again I decided to do a little more digging to see if there was more symbolism in that scene that I was missing out on.
I said it indirectly in my last post about it, but in many ways Spirited Away is a huge thematic departure from Miyazaki's previous works which focus primarily on achieving a balance between human achievement and harmony with nature. He said in an interview;
Miyazaki-sensei wrote:This movie is a story about a 10-year-old whose father and mother happened to eat something they shouldn't have, and so became pigs. The movie appears to be satire, but that isn't my purpose. I have five young female friends who are about the same age as Hiiragi-san*, and I spend every summer with them at my mountain cabin. I wanted to make a movie they could enjoy. That is why I started this film, and that is my true purpose.
*HIIRAGI Rumi, the 13-year-old voice actress of Chihiro. She was at the press conference during which this interview took place.
We have made "Totoro," which was for small children, "Laputa," in which a boy sets out on a journey, and "Kiki's Delivery Service," in which a teenager has to live with herself. We have not made a film for 10-year-old girls, who are in the first stage of their adolescence. So, I read the shoujo manga such as Nakayoshi or Ribon which they left at my mountain cabin.
I felt this country only offered such things as crushes and romance to 10-year-old girls, though, and looking at my young friends, I felt this was not what they held dear in their hearts, not what they wanted. And so I wondered if I could make a movie in which they could be heroines...
If they find this movie to be exciting, it will be a success in my mind. They can't lie. Until now, I made "I wish there was such a person" leading characters. This time, however, I created a heroine who is an ordinary girl, someone with whom the audience can sympathize, someone about whom they can say, "Yes, it's like that." It's very important to make it plain and unexaggerated. Starting with that, it's not a story in which the characters grow up, but a story in which they draw on something already inside them, brought out by the particular circumstances... I wanted to tell such a story in this movie. I want my young friends to live like that, and I think they, too, have such a wish.
Thematically Spirited Away is all about retaining one's identity even as one must adapt to the changing demands of the world, and specifically about doing so through adolescence. I think this is pretty well known, so I'm going to focus on that train scene because there's an elusive quality of it that relates to this theme. And for those who haven't seen it yet spoilers below:
Going into this scene we've got a few things to review: we've just finished the climax of the movie: Chihiro has through her own power rescued Haku from death, absolved Noh-Face of greed, and in doing so saved Yubaba's bathhouse from destruction. She then embarks on her next selfless act which is to return Zeniba's hanko; a hanko is a personal seal used in Japan and constitutes your signature on legally binding documents. It is extremely symbolic of one's identity, and its abduction could be seen as a kind of identity theft. To even further understand the significance of this act in Japanese culture, Chihiro is accepting the Giri (a word that can be translated as debt, but has much deeper cultural significance) of Haku's theft in order to clear his name. Her belief that Haku is not a thief and the desire to make that true overrides her indebtedness even to her parents who are still pigs. This is implicitly stated by Kamaji as he points out that tickets are extremely rare and that the train only runs in one direction. It is in this scene that Chihiro has made her first decision completely independently of others that isn't driven by necessity or circumstance.
On the train itself we see the large imposing figure of the conductor who silently and oppressively shreds her tickets as she boards the train. All the other figures here are shadowy, but unmistakably adults. Boh and the transformed bird hop excitedly at the prospect of being on a trip while Chihiro takes her place on the train stoically staring forwards, not looking back.
The scene is heavy with metaphor: this one-way journey for Chihiro is the adolescent's journey to adulthood. The shadowy figures on the train are the random disassociated strangers of adult life. The isolated landscapes separated by oceans those places we inhabit in our humdrum routine: home, work, the trainstops between them. The shadowy girl who looks to be Chihiro's age is her own self as a child, left behind in this transition.
The scene is heavy with something else, and this is what I couldn't quite put my finger on until I did the research behind it. Artists call it negative space, but the Japanese word for it is 間 (ma). When Roger Ebert told Miyazaki how he loved how motion is expressed in his movies he said, “...Instead of every movement being dictated by the story, sometimes people will just sit for a moment, or they will sigh, or look in a running stream, or do something extra. Not to advance the story, but only to give the sense of time and place and who they are.”
Miyazaki-sensei wrote:We have a word for that in Japanese, it’s called ‘Ma’. Emptiness. It’s there intentionally...he claps his hands three or four timesThe time in between my clapping is Ma. If you just had non-sto action with no breathing space at all, it’s just busyness. But if you take a moment, then the tension building in the film can grow into a wider dimension. If you just have constant tension at 80 degrees all the time you just get numb.
The people who make movies are scared of silence, so they want to paper and plaster it over. They’re worried that the audience will get bored. They might go up and get some popcorn. But just because it’s 80% intense all the time doesn’t mean the kids are going to bless you with their concentration. What really matters is the underlying emotions - that you never let go of those.
What my friends and I have been trying to do since the 1970s is to try an quiet things down a little bit; don’t just bombard them with noise and distraction. And to follow the path of children’s emotions and feelings as we make a film. If you stay true to joy and astonishment and empathy you don’t have to have violence and you don’t have to have action. They’ll follow you. This is our principle.
After Chihiro finds her place on the train and motions for Noh-face to sit beside her there is not a single word of dialogue spoken, or any action on her part (aside from looking forlorn out the window) for the next 2 minutes, not until she disembarks at Zeniba’s house. But this still speaks volumes about her character: she has gone from being a child, lounging in the back seat of her parents’ car, to being an adult taking responsibility for the three charges under her care. The carefree idleness of youth replaced by the anxious ambivalence of adulthood. I can’t take credit for this line, but it’s beautiful and I have to share it:
Christopher Runyon wrote:If My Neighbor Totoro is Miyazaki’s celebration of childhood, then Spirited Away‘s single train scene is a requiem: the ultimate depiction of a sad, lonely adult life devoid of joy and laughter. It is the death of youthful innocence; the sunset signaling the start of a long, dark night. Had it not been for Grave of the Fireflies, this single scene would have been the most grim and beautifully depressing thing to ever come out of the Studio–and it’s certainly the most grim and depressing to ever come out of Miyazaki.
Of course Miyazaki isn’t the only director to use Ma & metaphor to capture the audience’s emotions. What other anime has spirited you away?
飛べねぇ豚はただの豚だ。
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I'm dissapointed you didnt use the word shart in the new thread name.
Porco Rosso has a similar scene:
One doesn’t shitpost in the OP! What kind of forumer do you take me for?!
yeah it was a quiet pause
and I kinda like taking train rides where you're just heading further and further out there until you're the last people on the line
my streetcar ride home is kinda like that, by the time we get to my house we're almost at the terminus, so frequently I'm the last person on there
it's quiet and relaxing, lets your reflect on the day
Melancholy, sure. It was just "grim and depressing" that I took issue with.
I may be judging this harshly without the benefit of the context of a much longer analysis, but I can't help but feel that this misses a lot about the scene.
The shadowy adults of the train have a palpable weariness to them. They're drawn big and bulky, wearing thick jackets, hats and head coverings as if against cold or damp weather. They move slowly, weary, as if at the end of a long day's heavy work, or heading somberly towards a day (or night) of long work. The one exception is the shadow of the young girl that, alone, watches the train leave as it pulls away from the station where all the other adults get off and shuffle away.
There is definitely a feeling of "leaving behind" towards the girl. She, unlike the adults, faces the viewer as the train pulls away. So we have two "leaving behind" actions here. Chihiro leaving the girl, but also the adults leaving Chihiro. It's a great metaphor for Chihiro as moving out of childhood and into adolescence, or not-quite-adulthood. It's also a visual statement about Chihiro becoming fully the heroic character in her story: she is going to take action now, not be led like a child, and not be saved by an adult looking out for her.
The final shot of Chihiro, before the train zooms off into true night, dark clouds gathering that could become a storm, is of her staring in the direction the train is traveling (also, literally, visually, away from the adults who have left her, and away from the child she has left behind). Her expression is set, stern, determined, maybe a little angry. But there is also her reflection in the window behind her.
And her expression, reflected in the window is more ambiguous. Her eyebrows and her mouth are more neutral. And this reflection visually evokes the shadowy passengers and the girl at the station from earlier. Is her expression one of calm acceptance? Defeated weariness? Adolescent indifference? It sets us up for the next scenes of the film (will she succeed?) and also is yet another shadow to contrast her real, actual determination against.
Looks like they're posting it as it airs, and it's pretty new. Only seven episodes so far. It's also a manga still in progress so I'm not sure if the anime is aiming for a specific stopping point.
But without some early episode spoilers it's a viking drama. Famous viking warrior fakes his death after a realization he just cant take all the violence and death anymore and settles down with his family in Iceland.
Until inevitablely his past comes calling.
Yeah, it's an Amazon Prime exclusive. It's going to be a 24 episode run.
I'm pretty sure I know where the anime is going to end in relation to the manga, but of course to elaborate would be big spoilers for people who haven't gotten to that point in the manga yet.
Vinland Saga is an incredible manga and I'm glad that it's gotten enough steam to get an anime adaptation with a real budget behind it. I highly recommend people check it out - the seventh episode of the anime wraps up almost all the material in the first US volume (every one collects 2 Japanese volumes), and there's 10 volumes out so far with an 11th due out in November.
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Also with the contrast between Yubaba and Zeniba, where Yubaba rules a land that is bright and lively, but she's generally greedy and cruel, and Zeniba lives in a dark, quiet place and is seen is as scary and powerful, but when you meet her is actually kind and gentle.
I, meanwhile, finished watching on Netflix Kengan Ashura, or at least the episodes that are currently available. I enjoyed it, but it's propably because of strenth of the material it was adapted from, instead of it being a particularly good adaptation.
It adapted 72 manga chapters in 12 episodes, so, uh, it cut a lot of scenes, and it is noticable during watching, so at least now I am convinced to read the manga from the beginning.
It's dumb as hell, but it's very entertaining story about big strong people hitting each other very hard.
3:18
Wiki
Angel's Egg (天使のたまご Tenshi no Tamago) is a Japanese OVA film released by Tokuma Shoten on 15 December 1985. It was a collaboration between popular artist Yoshitaka Amano and director Mamoru Oshii. It features very little spoken dialogue. Its sparse plot and visual style have led to it being described as "animated art rather than a story".
This will be here until I receive an apology or Weedlordvegeta get any consequences for being a bully
Is manga also okay for discussing? Fan translations okay as long as we don't say where, or how does that work?
Rock Band DLC | GW:OttW - arrcd | WLD - Thortar
when in doubt,
don't
This is cool, I didn't know that. I was wondering where people were reading Dragon Ball Super but hadn't looked into it.
PSN: Robo_Wizard1
I wish there were an extended version of the ED
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Yea Jump is at the point where it's a ridiculous value and I'm happy to take advantage of it. Going back to other sites to read manga that aren't in Jump is painful by comparison.
Looking at you, cringey porn ads on all sides of the page.
Switch - SW-7373-3669-3011
Fuck Joe Manchin
And I don't think Berserk is ever going to reach a satisfying conclusion
Legal manga sites:
Viz: https://www.viz.com/shonenjump - most recent 3 chapters of basically all (not actually all) Shonen Jump series free to read, $2/mo for the back catalog of a LOT of them (but not all). Valid in English-speaking countries, I think.
Manga Plus: https://mangaplus.shueisha.co.jp/updates - same as the above, but worldwide (except Japan, which has their own service, I think?). No paid option for back catalogue available
Crunchyroll: https://www.crunchyroll.com/comics/manga - not a huge selection, but a few biggun's (AoT being the most obvious one).
~pretty much anything else~ can only be obtained via volume sales outside Japan, and in many cases not even that.
Still looking forward to new chapters despite that!
i mean I hope it reaches some kind of ending
but yeah at this point the pacing of the story and release schedule has kinda killed any momentum for me
This is like the fourth or fifth one over the last few months.
besides having to tell a select few people to occasionally stop being weird on rare occasions, we've been doing ok (and even the weird bits have been pretty under control, relative to how bad these threads used to get)