A visual masterpiece, but a failure at storytelling

Rating: Null/10 (9 June 2010)

Some call Hayao Miyazaki the Disney of Japan. In regards to this movie, I would like to offer my own analogy: he is the Don Bluth of Japan--he's an amazing animator, but a horrible storyteller.
The story starts out with Chichiro and her parents. They stop off at what looks like an empty carnival and the parents begin eating. This show of gluttony and greed transforms the parents into pigs, and as night falls, the spirits that inhabit this place come out. Chichiro winds up trapped with the spirits and winds up being captured by a witch who steals her name and forces her to work in the witch's bath house. Now it's up to Chichiro to get free and save her parents.
There are obviously more characters that I have not mentioned, but that in a nutshell is the plot. The problem is that Miyazaki doesn't want to develop it. Instead he opts for what seems like 1000 different sub-plots.
One deals with a river spirit, one deals with the witch's sister, another deals with a spirit called No-face, and the list goes on. The main plot is essentially forgotten until the very end of the film, and is resolved in the most trite of ways.
This is really the movie's big problem. It's as if Miyazaki and crew came up with a million ideas, and rather than pick one or two, they picked all of them. It doesn't only affect the plot, but also the look of the film. I understand that many of the creatures are traditional Japanese spirits (and I'll be the first to admit my lack of knowledge of Japanese culture), but there were simply too many weird creatures that serve no purpose. The witch for example has a baby that fills an entire room and three severed heads as assistants. Why? Because they could.
I honestly hated this movie. When it was finished I felt flabbergasted. It was uninvolving, nonsensical, pretentious, and boring. Everyone is entitled to their own opinion, but I honestly cannot understand why this movie is so well-loved. In my humble opinion, it is complete and utter drek.