The Sickness of Modern Society

Rating: 9/10 (5 June 2007)

Hayao Miyazaki's "Spirited Away" is a film all about the "illnesses" of modern society. A young girl, Chihiro, and her family are moving from the city into the country. They stop at a strange tunnel which leads to, what appears to be, an abandoned amusement park. However, they soon find out that it is not abandoned at all. Chihiro's parents stop a restaurant and eat everything in sight without even waiting to ask permission. Because of this they are transformed into pigs, and this starts Chihiro's journey to save her parents in the spirit world.
The most interesting thing about the movie is the way that Miyazaki portrays what he believes are the evils of modern society. At the bath house, Chihiro is confronted with a stink spirit. Because she is new, she is given the nasty job of preparing a bath for this creature. He is so sludgy and smelly that even a bowl of rice sitting next to him instantly rots. This spirit is the epitome of disgust. While Chihiro is preparing his bath, she notices something sticking out of the spirit's side. She alerts the other workers at the bath house and they help her pull it out. What Chihiro thought was a thorn turns out to be a bicycle and all other kinds of modern, industrial garbage. Once this litter is removed, it becomes obvious that this spirit was actually a polluted river god. The workers at the traditional Japanese bath house cleansed this god of all the pollution he received from the modern world. Miyazaki uses this to show how disgusting he thinks modern society is, and how he believes that a return to more traditional beliefs and values can cleanse society.
The second spirit Chihiro must deal with is a No Face. This spirit is mute and uses greed to get people's attention. When Chihiro first encounters him, he offers her more bath tokens than she needs. He believes that he will gain her friendship by giving her material things. She declines and takes only as many tokens as she needs. The No Face then lures a frog close to him by dropping gold on the floor, and then swallows the frog and steals his voice. The No Face makes everyone in the bath house go crazy with greed when he starts throwing gold all over the floor. But Chihiro is not influenced by this. She has begun to learn the traditional values and she can resist the temptation of wealth. She leads the No Face away from bath house and heals him. The No Face follows Chihiro to Zeniba's house out in the country. Zeniba lives a modest, traditional life. The No Face decides to stay with her and learns to knit and make things for others. Learning traditional values healed the No Face and transformed him into a spirit of giving rather than a spirit of greed.
This movie functions on two levels. It is an animated movie that one can sit down and watch just for the fun of it. For this reason I would recommend it for children. The animation is beautiful and you get attached to the characters easily. However, due to the serious, tradition versus modernity theme of the movie, it is also enjoyable for adults. This film works as a fun, children's movie and also a warning and lesson for the adults who watch it.