A beautiful work of art and symbolic film, but especially the third act doesn't provide satisfying answers

Rating: 7/10 (18 March 2019)

Spirited Away is both a beautiful to watch animated movie and gives the viewer plenty of ideas and symbols to ponder, but the story itself and particularly its conclusions left me ready to move on. I have the utmost respect for animation studios and Studio Ghibli after watching Spirited Away. Miyazaki puts in so many small visual details that immerse you in the spirit world and make it so much more realistic. In terms of the story itself, I found it inconsistent. There are plenty of great themes and ideas to consider, the two that stood out most to me being greed vs kindness in the characters, and the older, more naturalistic mindset clashing with the materialistic, capitalistic modern mindset. Chihiro is a fun protagonist who avoids one-dimensionality, having both a multifaceted personality and an arc that significantly shows her character develop throughout.
Where the story broke down for me was in several of the plot events and details of the world. Simply put, I found the ending to be deus ex machina and an overly simplistic and easy way to solve what had seemed like big, complex challenges. I didn't buy her sudden love with Haku and the way their relationship transitioned from a caring friendship to quite committed love. I also didn't find the addition of Yubaba's twin to make any sense, she felt like a superfluous character added in as a weird twist. The way she got her parents back felt completely absurd and was when I accepted that it just isn't a great movie. In addition to these and other plot frustrations, maybe it was an intentional choice to make the spirit world feel whimsical and ambiguous, but the lack of clarity in how the world functions limited my enjoyment. Are all of them spirits? How many of them are being held there against their will (like Haku)? What is the true motivation of all the spirits? How do the spirits interact with the physical world, and how do their transformations and magical powers work? I found many underlying workings of the spirit world to be unclear in addition to plot points that were either contrived or superfluous. I definitely enjoyed watching it and I do like the consistent, immersive feel of the movie from a young girl discovering this wild world perspective, but the exposition and later plot events didn't completely satisfy me.