Every parent should watch this movie for the sake of their children

Rating: 10/10 (26 October 2017)

This is by far one of my favorite movies of all times.
First of all, the drawing is absolutely superb and the watcher is totally immersed in this magical world.
Then, what makes me love this movie above all is not only that the message conveyed is pretty strong, but that actually many people see, FEEL, the message differently. That is the greatest strength of the movie that, by sending the watcher back in his own childhood, succeeds in making emotions arise that will be different for each person, depending on each one life.
I don't pretend having understood the movie better than anyone else but here is how I felt it.
Chihiro indeed enters somewhere as a children, and, being forced to face a number of issues alone, by taking her own responsibilities without the presence of her parents, succeeds in leaving it.
Many people see in the movie the passage from childhood to adult, passage that is done when a children has to take decisions in certain circumstances when there isn't really someone present to take him/her by the hand. But, that is not how I see it, at least not totally. I believe that in fact this movie wants to convey this message, but equally another one.
The entire troubles, throughout the ENTIRE movie, are exclusively the outcome of human natural thirst for greed and power. There isn't a single trouble in the movie that is not related to such behavior.
The only person that succeeds in overcoming each of those issues is Chihiro. All other ones have been trapped.
And that is the subtlety of the movie: What did Miyazaki intended to tell? Simply being critic toward our own nature? I don't believe so.
This movie opened my eyes as a father: why did Chihiro succeed when others failed? Because she faced each issue while being totally immune to power and money, making very simple choices, without fear, simply following what her pure children's hearth commands her to do.
And that is an eye-opener: what if as a parent, finally, we don't have more to learn from our children than they have to learn from us? What if finally, we should try to be more like them rather than trying to make them look like us, corrupted adults? From the day I watched the movie, I'm trying to leave my kids be, take their own decision, and helping them to make their decisions following their hearth rather than my 'hard-given' advises.