Plot Details: This opinion reveals minor details about the movie's plot.

Chihiro is a girl in transition. Her parents are moving from one city to another and she has to move with them, no matter how many times she protests. Just before arriving at their new house, the father takes a wrong turn and ends up at this run-down façade. The parents want to look around, but the daughter wants to wait by the car because the place looks scary to her. (She goes along because she’s more scared of the prospect of waiting by the car by herself.)

On the other side of a tunnel, the three find what the father believes is an abandoned theme park. Amazingly, they find a food stand that’s open and has fresh food out, but no one is there. The parents start eating, saying that they’ll settle the bill later, but Chihiro wants no part of it. She wanders off to look around the area. She meets Haku, who warns her and her parents to leave immediately. When she goes back to her parents, she finds that they’ve literally turned into pigs. She can’t leave in time and ends up trapped in an unfamiliar area.

I don’t want to give away anything else. Much of the fun comes in seeing the amazing visuals, but there is something to be said for the story. I think that it’s best not to give away too much. I will say that even though it may be billed as children’s, it is still enjoyable by adults. Both my brother and I watched this movie and loved it.

Part of that has to do with the fact that we’re both fans of animation. Spirited Away has some amazing artwork. There are all sorts of nonhuman characters, such as a toad and a radish spirit. There are also some stranger characters, such as a ghost-like entity known as No-face. Add to that the scenery. Chihiro, No-face and a few other characters go on a train ride and see a good deal of what the area has to offer.

The movie (at least the American release) came on two discs. I didn’t get the second disc because I’m sharing a subscription to NetFlix and I only get one disc at a time. The release I got was also dubbed, which I don’t mind so much. I really don’t think that subtitles would have worked for this movie; they would have been too distracting.

This is a five-star movie. I tend to reserve five stars for movies that I thought were exceptional and this was an exceptional movie. This was a movie that left me thinking after I saw it, not just about the ending, but also about the whole movie and what had happened. The movie is meant to convey something rather than just to entertain the audience.

I’d like my parents to see it, but they have a low “weird” threshold, and this movie does have a bit of strangeness to it. However, most people that like anime can get past that pretty quickly. There are a lot of different aspects to this movie. I’d definitely recommend renting it.


Lilo & Stitch:
http://www.epinions.com/content_177304866436

NetFlix:
http://www.epinions.com/content_142673350276



Recommended: Yes

Viewing Format: DVD
Suitability For Children: Suitable for Children up to Age 4