"Spirited Away", the level of horror has reached its maximum!

Nov 20, 2019 22:00

The level of horror has reached its maximum! A complete explanation of "Spirited Away" from 8 minutes to 16 minutes.

I'm Toshio Okada.

Today we bring you the highlights from the Toshio Okada seminar "13 Mysteries of Reading 'Spirited Away' [Part 1]" delivered on 11/03/2019.

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7 minutes and 38 seconds. A mysterious scene spreads out in front of you through the tunnel.

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It's fast, isn't it? 7 minutes and 38 seconds to get here, so it's quite a pace, say in a Hollywood movie.

This sign with the creepy eyes, it's a little like a Yoshiharu Tsuge manga. From here, the camera goes down to the bottom of the stairs, where the father, mother, and then Chihiro go up the stairs.

An empty entertainment district spreads out. This place is already between the world of fantasy and the world of reality, though. It was originally a sacred land for the gods, but just before the collapse of the bubble economy, Japan had too much money, so they built a lot of strange buildings, and now ghosts live there.

Well, Chihiro's father says that it is a remnant of the bubble economy. In fact, there have always been huge and strange theme parks like this in Japan.

For example, in Asakusa, Tokyo, there was a park called the Mt Fuji Tourist Attraction since the Meiji era.

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[Image] Mt Fuji Tourist Attraction

This is a kind of pamphlet from that time. Mt. Fuji was built as a real set in Asakusa's Rokku district in 1887. It was 32 meters high, so it was quite a tall building. You can climb to the top of it.

There is also a photo. There are some photos, but they are not very good quality.

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[Image] Asakusa Fuji

In the foreground, there is a man riding a bicycle. This is what they call Asakusa Fuji. It was 32 meters high, so it was quite a tall building.

This building was torn down in 1889, and later became the Ryounkaku building. It is what is called the Asakusa Twelfth Floor. Well, it's a building that looks like the Leaning Tower of Pisa standing vertically.

This is how it was built. There are still prints from that time.

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[Image] Asakusa Fuji Print

These buildings were built in Asakusa.

During the bubble economy period from the Meiji era to the Taisho era, there were an awful lot of these buildings. There were many famous ones such as Keio Garden, Kagetsuen Amusement Park, and Togetsuen. There were all kinds of famous ones.

Also, the Okuyama landscape in Asakusa was said to be a department store of shrines and temples, where you could visit all kinds of gods and Buddha.

As for novels, this was the time when Edogawa Rampo wrote "Panorama Island Tales" and "Ghost Tower". This is similar to "Spirited Away", isn't it? From the end of the Meiji era to the Taisho era, when Japan was experiencing a bit of a bubble economy, they built a theme park that neglected the gods, and strange things happened there," was the story that Edogawa Rampo and others wrote.

If you want to know more about this, I'll show you some materials and talk about it in today's "after-school program".

In other words, what I want to say is that "Spirited Away" is actually set in a theme park that has been destroyed and inhabited by ghosts.

・・・

Nine minutes. Chihiro's parents find a delicious looking dish and eat it without a second thought. Chihiro has a bad feeling about it, so she doesn't eat it and leaves her parents to go for a walk in the city.

This is the scene.

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The empty downtown area stretches on forever. This lantern will be a nice touch later on, though. In this cut, I like that Chihiro is standing at the edge of the screen.

Also, please pay attention to the position of this shadow. The shadow of the building is falling. This one is almost directly above, or rather, the sunlight is coming from a position that is just slightly tilted. This is a foreshadowing of something scary that will happen later.

There is no waste. When showing a deserted shopping street like this, he intentionally put the main character on the left side of the screen and cast a shadow on the other side, so that it is brightly lighted and nothing scary is happening. It's a way to show that "scary things are going to happen" on the other side of the screen.

From here, things start to get scarier and scarier.

When she walks up the stairs, there is a mysterious building.

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There are magnificent pine trees, lanterns, a red arched bridge, and a huge bathhouse called "Aburaya" can be seen beyond it.

The reason why there is a arched bridge is because it is a gateway to another world, more than anything else.This is the so-called "Shenxian Thought" (*1). In China, there is a rule that wherever a hermit lives, there is always a arched bridge with a raised center.

*1) In ancient China, people believed in the existence of immortal beings, so-called "hermits," and wished to become hermits themselves through hermetic practices.

So when the rich people of old Japan built Japanese gardens, they called them "Japanese gardens," but they were building the land of the Chinese gods where the hermits lived. That's why when they put miniature bridges, they always put these arched bridges.

So there's a huge arched bridge like that, and a gorgeous building on the other side of it.

11 minutes and 15 seconds. When Chihiro tries to cross the arched bridge and go in front of the Aburaya. Actually, you can't cross it. It's God's land from there on. Then Haku, a boy in white clothing, appeared and said, "Go back! You can't go any further from here!".

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This is that Haku. "Go back! Don't go!" He says as he approaches the front of the screen.

At this moment, the shadow behind Haku starts to grow rapidly, because the sun is setting so fast, and the shadow on the bridge behind him is growing fast. Haku is in a hurry to speak to her, but as he speaks, his profile becomes redder and redder, and as the sunset approaches, we can see that the shadow is growing sideways.

This is a horror movie about vampires. It's a very scary expression around here.

In this world of gods and hermits, where the Aburaya exists, time passes at this speed.

It is about ten times faster than reality. I'll explain why it's ten times faster later.

Actually, for Chihiro, "Spirited Away" is a four-day story. It's a story of four days and three nights, but in the real world, about a month has passed within that time.

This "tenfold time" is also an important point related to the second half of the theme I'll explain next week, so please don't forget it.

・・・

Anyway, as time started to pass at a great speed, the empty town was lighted up with red lights one after another, and black shadows started to sprout from the ground.

Chihiro panicked and said, "Father, mother!" and tried to run away, but before she knew it, her father and mother were turned into pigs as punishment for eating the offerings of the gods.

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In addition, a black ghost-like figure appears in the darkened city.

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Hayao Miyazaki is very good around here, isn't he? In the empty town, a black shadow sprouts out from the ground and moves around Chihiro, who is standing anxiously.

When Chihiro goes down the first staircase to escape without her parents, black shadows start walking from the staircase as well.

It becomes more and more of a horror movie.

But when she goes down the stairs she came up earlier, she notices that the stairs have turned into water.

Before she knows it, the tunnel she just went through is far away, and she can see the lights of the city, and on the way there, it's like a river or an ocean, and she can't go back.

This area is a desperate but beautiful landscape.

Hayao Miyazaki doesn't just show these situations. Chihiro says, "Oh my God, this is not true, this is not true! Go away, go away! Disappear! Disappear!". Then, her body starts to disappear.

At the same time as her body becomes transparent, a gorgeous ferryboat appears, from which a monster-like creature rises to the shore. She can see them through her transparent hands.

In other words, there are two situations: Chihiro is staring at her transparent hand in fear and feeling "Oh, my body is becoming transparent and disappearing!", and she sees a shining ship appearing beyond it. "What's happening now?" and "the change in Chihiro's body" are shown in one frame at the same time. This is an amazingly skilful cut.

It's not just an explanation, but it has suspense and what will happen next. The storyboarding here is really a masterpiece.

When this boat reaches the shore, God comes down from inside.

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God, especially Japanese God, is invisible. They have no form.

I think I've explained this before, but the reason why the Namahage of Akita wear such masks and mino (straw cape) is because gods are essentially invisible, and by covering them with mino (straw cape) and masks, they can be seen as gods.

This is similar to the spirits called Lee and Pee, who are also believed in in New Guinea and other places. That's why the English title of "Spirited Away" is "Spirited Away". This "Spirit" is closer to a spirit than to a god, isn't it?

This is a god who is invisible and only has a mask. However, when he comes down to the shore where Chihiro is, his body becomes more and more real, and the image of God, which should not be visible, becomes visible.

This is the place between God's world and the real world where humans live.

In this way, more and more gods come ashore. Well, at this time, Chihiro doesn't know that this is a god, but thinks it is a ghost.

Chihiro was cowering in fear and couldn't move. Then, Haku, the beautiful boy, comes and feeds her something from this world. He says, "If you don't eat something from this world, you'll disappear," and her body, which had been on the verge of becoming transparent, finally returns to normal.

Furthermore, Haku took Chihiro to the side of the Aburaya where they had just been and said, "You must meet Kamaji in the boiler room and ask him to let you work. Anyone who doesn't do the job will be turned into an animal by the wizard Yubaba, who rules the bathhouse".

・・・

So far, 16 minutes. These 16 minutes are incredibly dense, and the description is completely horror.

It is a horror film, but it is made as a horror film that children can just barely watch.

But there are some scenes that you would like to see in a horror movie, such as "The parents are doing something that they shouldn't, and you try your best to stop them, but they won't listen to you," or "You have a bad feeling, but you go in there," or even "The sun, which was shining high in the sky a while ago, sets at an unbelievable speed, the city goes dark, and strange things appear just like in a vampire movie.". In just 16 minutes, there are a lot of very interesting horror movie developments.

I really think it's the best horror movie in the world, but "Spirited Away" is not really appreciated as a horror movie.

The first of the 14 mysteries of Spirited Away, what is this mysterious world?

In fact, a theme park was built on top of an ancient sacred place by a conceited person during the bubble economy. Furthermore, because of the destruction of that theme park, the entire so-called theme park has become a haunted house. That's the true nature of this mysterious world.

In other words, this is "The Shining". The Shining" and other haunted houses are replaced by a huge frame.

That's why people don't notice that it's a haunted house movie. Instead, people think it's a mysterious fantasy world. That fascinating introduction is completely a horror movie.

However, in the middle of the story, the story takes a strange turn, as she begins to feel for the ghosts and work with them.

The story is about a girl who enters such a world and can't escape.

Her parents turn into pigs, and her own body keeps disappearing. What should I do? she thought.

This horror movie actually turns into an entertaining fantasy movie from here on.

Actually, there is an original story behind this development of "entering the world of horror from the world of reality, but gradually turning into a fantasy". Let's talk about the original story in the next section.

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(Witten by Toshio Okada)

"Spirited Away", the level of horror has reached its maximum!

The level of horror has reached its maximum! A complete explanation of "Spirited Away" from 8 minutes to 16 minutes.

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