Spirited Away

Spirited Away
Rachel Duncan
Middle School – Gifted Enrichment
Spirited Away is a beautifully animated film about the adventures of a young girl named Chihiro, who finds herself swept away into a mysterious and surreal world filled with gods, witches, spirits and symbolism.
Chihiro and her parents become lost on the way to their new home and wander into a strange and spooky town. Her parents, when tempted with a large amount of unsupervised food, are transformed into pigs as she watches, helpless and scared. Eventually, Chihiro is forced to change her name and work as a servant in and around the bath houses featured in this strange new world in order to save her parents and return to her own world. During her time in this otherworldly realm, she befriends a River Spirit who sometimes takes the shape of a young boy and at other times embodies the form of a dragon. Chihiro ultimately finds inner strength, bravery, and kindness that allow her to save not only her parents, but herself, as well.
Spirited Away deals with many Japanese cultural concepts including religion, philosophy and mythology. It is appropriate for elementary and middle school levels studying Asian history, culture or even examples of anime.
The story is imaginative and the characters and animations endlessly unique and strange. The main characters are likeable - we become immersed with Chihiros adventures inside this bathhouse. The other characters she comes into contact with as she tries to save her parents and get back to the human world are both bizarre and beautiful. The animation gives it a real sense of cinematography, the drawings make the film stand out in a way that American animations rarely do.

Sue Fink
6th Grade World Geography
Miyazaki's Spirited Away Film Review
Spirited Away is a story about a 10 year old girl named Chihiro. She is upset because her family is moving to a new house and she will attend a new school. On their way to their new house they get trapped in an alternate reality. In this fantasy story Chihiro and her parents are trapped in a world of spirits. She must be courageous and work hard to free her parents and get back to the outside world. Chihiro makes a transition from helpless girls to a very capable individual in the story. She encounters many people who help her on her journey. In the beginning of the story her goal is to save her parents and get home. She never loses focus on saving her parents but she also helps other in need along the way. The story has a number of meaningful lessons for example Chihiro is often belittled but is kind and helpful to everyone she encounters.
This movie would be appropriate for middle school students. It is rated G has some scary parts but it also has moral lessons and shows numerous intricate Japanese architecture, gardens, and artistic vases. The structures in the movie along with the red lanterns and clothing are good examples of the Japanese culture. The Japanese written language can be seen throughout the movie. Boh the baby in the film has his name written on his bib.
Along with a discussion on Japanese culture following this movie. I would also discuss some of the moral issues addressed, in the beginning Chihiro is selfish, her parents are greedy, Haku helps a friend, Yubaba is overbearing , intimidating, greedy, selfish but also motherly. As the story unfolds and Chihiro grows as a person she always shows kindness to those around her and finds the strength to overcome her fears to save herself, her parents and others who also need help. There would be much to discuss with middle school students regarding the good and evil in this film.

Chihiro, a young girl, shows great courage and perseverance in the movie Spirited Away. In order to save her parents from a life trapped in the spirit world she resolves to face her fears and through determination and hard work she succeeds. Her childlike innocence guides her in making friends and helping those in need. Chihiro is respectful and mannerly to everyone regardless of their appearance or her fear. She doesn’t complain as she is assigned to clean the largest tub or that she is assigned to bathe a very dirty spirit. She assumes the same responsibility as the more experienced workers.
Even though I am not familiar with the belief system of Japan, I found Spirited Away to be lively and entertaining. The menagerie of characters that visit or work at the bathhouse were very interesting and obviously symbolic. Some characters were people, other appeared as people and changed into animals, still others appeared as animals and talked like people. The characters, regardless of their appearance, evoked emotion from the audience. I felt sad that No Face was on the outside and was glad when Chihiro befriended him. Also, the Radish Spirit initially was frightening but appeared to help Chihiro reach her goal. This ability of unfamiliar characters to capture your excitement makes Spirited Away quite enjoyable. While I enjoyed this movie, I would not show it in the preschool age class. Some of the scenes and characters may be too frightening for the children.

James Gouker
6 – 12 Art
Pittsburgh SciTech
Spirited Away is a very lively movie that is just as accessible for small children, middle school students, high school students and even adults. There is most definitely something for everyone. The movie subtly and skillfully mixes religious symbolism, artfulness and amazing storytelling in animation into a package that excites the mind and inspires thought.
The religious symbolism that is expressed in Spirited Away is through the native Japanese spirituality of Shintoism. Shintoism is basically a religious type of philosophy that gives spirits, or godlike qualities to animals, and many natural — yet abstract — elements. The setting of the movie is a Shinto bathhouse, which looks like a shrine, in a spirit world. It is here that very early into the film, Chihiro watches her parents become pig spirits, leading her to slavery. Chihiro meets many other spirits, a River Spirit, a boy who is really a white dragon, twin witches, a frog, a stink spirit, one with no-face, three dis-embodied heads, etc. These allegorical features give the film a feeling of historical and spiritual depth that adds to its allure.
The movie has a definite sense of artfulness, as well. The art style that it most resembles is Surrealism. Surrealism has a number of agreed-upon tenants that attempts to define it. The tenants that appear in the visuals of Spirited Away are: juxtaposition, scale, dislocation, and transformation (and to lesser degrees, levitation and transparency [No-Face]). In the very beginning of the film, the film sets a surrealistic tone by transforming Chihiro’s parents into ugly, gluttonous pigs. There is a heavy use of juxtaposition in such great visuals as witch twins’ Yubaba and Zeniba as birds with female’s heads and much later a light that hops around on a hand. The use of scale is most obviously seen in the witches’ heads throughout, which are gigantic and Boh, an enormous baby. Dislocation is used so perfectly and very humorously in the three disembodied heads that bounce around to attend to Yubaba. The movie definitely creates a surreal atmosphere for which the audience can occupy and enter the spirit world in a very artful, dreamlike sense.
The characters, design and gender selection, allow for more accessibility over a broad range of ages, races and both sexes. It is a well-known idea that the less realistic a face is drawn, the more people will identify with that character. Chihiro does not look particularly realistic or specific, so she looks like everyone. She does not look specifically Asian or American or European, so she looks like them all. One of the most refreshing points is also having a lead character that is not male or a princess. Chihiro is a very accessible character for both boys and girls not only because of how she relates to the surreal environment around her, but because of how she is drawn.
Spirited Away is a story that is dense and difficult in ideas and visual motifs, but easy to digest through character design and familiar, yet unique characters. There is an allure to this movie that transcends a lot of the animation genre and can be invigorating for a wide range of people. It comes with an incredibly high level of recommendation.

Name; Wendy Moore
Grade: Middle School
Subject: Communications/Social Studies
School: Pittsburgh Science and Technology Academy
As the first activity in our Japanese Korean Cultural Club at my school, we watched the movie Spirted Away. I had previously watched the movie with my own children and new my middle schoolers would enjoy it, however I was blown away with their reaction. Not only were they interested in it, but they kept asking questions about what was included in the movie. My middle schoolers then went and researched on their own with no extra credit various items in the movie and reported back to the group. Topics that they further researched included: public baths in Japan, obesity issues compared with the United States, food and cooking styles, dragons in history and iconology, supernatural beliefs, importance of family, geography and trains. Students were excited to explore these topics in general and share with the group with no prompting from me. For that reason I give it a five start rating.

Posted by Matthew Kizior
NCTA Office Assistant
Spirited Away is a film lauded for its fantastic animated visuals and endearing narrative. Yet, as Westerners, we miss a few particulars in the movie that strongly hint to certain aspects of Japanese myth and religion. These mythological and religious aspects are not only based off of certain types of characters and stories that are found in Japanese culture, but are also just plain Japanese cultural norms that the western world is not often exposed to. I will illustrate my point using three examples.
1) The Ambiguity of Character in Spirited Away
In the western world, we usually make moral demarcations between right and wrong. This causes us to have a black and white view of the world: one side has to be right, and the other side has to be wrong. This moral view of the world is found within the great western religious traditions that have spread all over the world. The God of the Bible is found to be the ultimate source of truth and good, while his nemesis, the Devil, is seen as a liar and evil. This example illustrates that good and evil are always in contention, always against each other. This greatly contrasts with the traditional Japanese view that forces, moral or otherwise, are usually more ambiguous in their character and actions, often performing both through the course of a story.
In Spirited Away, we are introduced to the characters of Zeniba. Zeniba is the twin sister of the witch and proprietor of the movie’s bath house, Yubaba. The first time we are introduced to her, she is mercilessly attacking Yubaba’s servant, Haku. She is quite angry and lets all the characters around her, other than main character Chihiro, feel the brunt of her anger, even turning her nephew into a mouse. Yet, when we are later re-introduced to Zeniba later on in the film, we find her to be act kind and warmly to Chihiro. This time around, she acts more like a grandmother, dispensing wisdom and care to Chihiro. This is different from the last time Zeniba was in the film, in which she almost killed another character, spilling Haku’s blood everywhere. In Zeniba’s defense though, she acts like anyone else would after having a precious object stolen from her. The only difference is that she is able to carry out the punishment most of us only think about. This anger does not make her a bad character, it makes her a person. The last scene she appears in shows she can act as kind and caring as anybody else. So while she may look like a witch, we are taught that appearances and intent can be deceiving. This message is only made clearer through the character of No-Face.
Zeniba is not unlike the Japanese god of storms, Susanoo. A troublesome god, he ransacked heaven to his sister’s, the sun goddess Amaterasu, dismay. She went into hiding because of this, and Susanoo was banished heaven for having upset his sister as such. Yet, he is never painted as an evil character. Unlike the Devil of Western lore, he is not cast out of heaven and then relegated to the pits of Hell. Indeed, he does the opposite. He saves a maiden from the seven-headed serpent, and goes on to achieve other notable feats. Looking back at the mythology of Susanoo, the ransacking of heaven looks to be the work of an unruly youth and nothing more. So, it is with these examples of Zenia and Susanoo that we can see that characters in Japanese stories are not deemed as either evil or good. They are capable of both. These characters mimic human nature in that humans are capable of as much good as bad, and for that, we cannot put either ourselves or these characters into neat moral distinctions.
2) That Witch is not a Witch
I mentioned earlier that Zeniba is the twin sister of a witch we are introduced to earlier on in the film. The name of that witch is Yubaba, and for all intents and purposes she acts as the “witch” of the movie. Why is she a witch? Well, she can pull Chihiro into her office with a wave of her hand, she is able to turn her employees into giant bouncing heads, and she even has the ability to turn into a crow-like creature. Seems like she fills the category of a witch, right? Well, for western audiences at least. Japanese culture really has no equivalent. Yet, Yubaba is also able to fill other roles that are captured within Japanese history. As proprietor of the bath house, she acts as a sort of den mother to all who work there. She gives them quarters to sleep in, food, and jobs that tip good from time to time. In this vein, Yubaba has more in common with the elder women that looked over the prostitutes of the red-light districts in the sprawling cities of Japan. She acts like it to. She tallies her money, keeps a watchful eye over any miscreant guests, and uses a forceful hand. There is also the fact that Japanese religion and history are rife with female shamans. The first ruler of Japan, then known as Yamato, was said to be a shamaness known as Himiko, who was known for her spells and great power. Yubaba is also rather similar to a female shaman. She is feared for the power that others assume she has, and when she shows it, it relies more on her own power than that of spells. She is also present in the spirit world, giving her an enormously strong connection to the powers that reside in that domain. Yubaba even has a more human look about her when compared to the other spirits, giving a hint that it is the human-type character that has the ability to channel this power, not the spirits themselves.
3) Spirits, Spirits, and More Spirits
A Western audience may not understand why Miyazaki drew the background characters in the movie like he did. We see giant waddling ducks, a spirit with an expressionless mask, and even a large character known as the “Radish Spirit”. Are these just randomly drawn characters, or is there some meaning attached to them? If you were able to answer yes to that question, then you are correct. Miyazaki did not just randomly draw spirits, but he created these various spirits within the context of Japanese mythology and the beliefs of the native Japanese religion, Shinto. In Shinto, it is said that all things are “kami”, a word used to describe anything ranging from a god, to a spirit, or to any object that may inspire awe. This means that most natural objects that we perceive as sedentary and dead actually have a sort of essence that, through the right channels, we can perceive.
Miyazaki provides such a channel through his film. He personifies the spirit of a radish through the radish spirit. The giant ducks are actually kappa, deadly water spirits that drag children into rivers to drown (Miyazaki paints a nicer picture). When we are introduced to the boiler room, the soot from the furnace is shown to be working for the creature named Kumaji that runs that place. These are susuwatari, soot spirits that work hard but shy away from any visitors. Miyazaki doesn’t just focus on the minute details of the Japanese spirit world though. He dreams bigger, and does so in a way we did not quite expect. Miyazaki goes about this by introducing what appears to be a sludge spirit halfway through the movie. The monster has garbage trailing behind him, and the employees and other customers cannot stand his smell. After he takes a bath though, everything changes. It is revealed that he is a dragon-like creature that has water for a body. He is a river spirit, carrying around the pollution and trash that had accumulated in his river. This nod to environmental pollution is also a nod to Shinto. Shinto maintains that the environment is sacred. Many mountains and other natural objects are used as sites of worship, or are the objects of worship. Miyazaki not only shows how Shinto kami can be represented, but even includes the fact that the sites themselves are sacred and divine to Shinto and the Japanese sensibility of the spiritual. This gives his movie both a flavor of religion and myth, and religious theme that some Japanese would be able to realize and relate to. Through the mediums of film and animation, Hayao Miyazaki has been able to capture the basic tenets of what makes Japanese religion what it is and how that informs the viewpoints of the society that has grown around it.
Hayao Miyazaki made Spirited Away with a Japanese audience in mind. So we as westerners must then take the time out to understand what it is exactly that makes this film Japanese to begin with. The characters and spirits, along with their powers and appearances, are all a testament to Japanese myth and religiosity. They express facets of Japanese identity and culture that we have to understand the context of so that we can understand what kind of world it is that Chihiro has found herself in. Hopefully these three points have provided a decent introduction to the difference regarding Japanese views, and how Spirited Away can be used as a teaching opportunity that can communicate this to students.

Spirited Away is a film that can be used to help teach students various aspects of Japanese mythology and religiosity. If there are any teachers that are teaching classes focused on Japanese history, culture, or language, if the film Spirited Away ever comes up during class discussion, these next three points may come in handy in the near future:
1. The ambiguity of the Japanese viewpoint
Western society is said to have a black-and-white view when it comes to how we designate the moral quality of certain characters. God is good, the devil is bad. Yet, when it comes to Japanese society, there are no clear-cut concepts within the country's mythology that has any character or creature as resolutely "good" or "bad". The greatest distinction usually lies with whether someone has been "virtuous" or "troublesome". This delineation can be seen through some of the characters in Spirited Away. The main "villain", Yubaba, has a twin sister named Zeniba. The first time we see Zeniba, she has almost succeeded in killing a secondary character, Haku, with her magic. Zeniba is angry, not only taking it out on Haku, but also on her nephew, turning him into a small mouse. From this quick scene, the audience makes the assumption that Zeniba must be just as bad her sister. It is only later on that we really see how nice of a person Zeniba is, helping the main heroine, Chihiro, on her journey and treating her with kindness. This is a good example of how Japanese mythology, while it may from time to time have it's expressly good and bad characters, usually show that a character's personality has as much capacity for one as the other. The characters are never one-dimensional, showing both negative and redemptive/positive qualities.
2. Gods and Rivers
There is no express religiosity in Spirited Away, but that is only because the religion/spiritual aspect of Japanese culture is so tightly intertwined with everyday life on the island nation. No where is this more clear than through the films of Studio Ghibli, which are rife with connections between the divine and environmental aspects of the world. In Princess Mononoke, all the animals that reside in a forest that a nearby human village wants to tear down is replete with enormous and powerful beasts that have been blessed by the god of the forest. If the humans want to have any chance of getting their hands on the forest, they would have to destroy the god that protects it. In My Neighbor Totoro, small Shinto shrine and gohei (blessed paper) strips surround ancient trees. Pom Poko, a movie about tanuki (raccoon-like trickster spirits) taking back their land, has a scene where they show the humans what life used to be like before the city grew as large as it did, showing the sprawling greenery and old wood houses.
This connection between the environment and the divine is also exemplified throughout Spirited Away. There is a smelly and disgusting spirit that enters the bathhouse that is the main setting of the movie. We are led to believe that this is a "stink spirit" at first glance. As the stink spirit takes the bath that he came for though, we are in for a surprise when he is finally clean. The stink spirit turns out to be a river god, suffering from the effects of the pollution that ruined his river. After his bath is done, he immediately flies away, his dragon-like body composed of water flying away into the sky. The character of Haru is also found to be a river spirit near the end of the movie. Displaced because of city development, he found his way to the bathhouse after losing his memory, becoming a servant to the owner Yubaba. The divine and the elemental aspects of nature are never far from each other, and Studio Ghibli films try to make the fact blatant that the environment is, in a way, indeed divine.
3. Is Yubaba a Witch?
This is more of an answer to a question that may arise in the mind of viewers than an exposition on the nature of Japanese mythology and spirituality. The antagonist Yubaba has powers that nothing short of magical: she can turn into a giant crow, take away Chihiro's real name, and control objects with a wave of her finger. Western audiences, seeing these actions occur, would not be wrong to label Yubaba as a witch at first sight. Yet, when it comes to the Japanese character of the movie, there really is no concept of a witch in Japanese mythology. Japanese religiosity/spirituality has a long history of shamanesses and miko (young female priestesses). These types of women are usually characterized as extremely powerful and in tune with the spirit world in a way that gives them access to supernatural powers. Indeed, it is commonly cited that a shamaness named Himiko is credited with ruling the earliest incarnation of the Japanese state, known as Yamato. Her powers made her feared throughout the land. There is also the fact that Yubaba's powers are only a metaphorical flourish. Her status as master of the bathhouse could be seen as closely related to such roles as that of den mother for the prostitutes found in the red light districts of Japan. If so, this would give Yubaba an extra layer of authority that we may not have noticed before. With these examples to consider, Yubaba's supernatural powers and air of authoritative dominance make her less a witch than a powerful woman to be feared, something not uncommon in stories of any kind.
Spirited Away is a film that was made with Japanese audiences in mind. The notion of fitting it to western standards probably never occurred to the team that was working on it. This means that when western audiences did finally watch the movie, there were more than likely a few concepts and cultural touchstones that westerners did not catch up on at first. So, if a person watched it for the first time, they may not recognize why certain characters are river gods, if either of the "witches" are villains, or what the underlying message of the movie may be. Hopefully these three points have been useful as a guide to certain aspects of Japanese mythology, and what that can tell us about Japanese culture as a whole.

NCTA Seminar on East Asia
Terry Owens
Review: Spirited Away film by Miazuki
Grade: 10th World History, AP US History, Global Issues
Pine Richland HS
Miazuki’s film at first seems to be about a typical, whiny, pre-teen named Chihoro. But when Chihoro is faced with the challenge of survival in a strange magical place, her resiliency emerges. Her parents have been transformed into pigs, she must deal with an old lady, cranky and obsessed with greed and gain, and other pitfalls on her journey out of this pace and before she is reunited with her parents. On the basis of this coming of age framework, the film would be useful in middle school, However, I would play this in high school on the basis of the following analysis.
This film is definitely a reaction to capitalist interference in Japanese society and shows the Japanese interest in nature and the environment. There are many examples of this in the film: one character,"no face", represents an innocent Japanese society which has turned to craziness by capitalism. He is a character driven mad by the greed and selfishness of the people around him . He is like a child-blank slate-changed by people and greed around him. Another character, "muck spirit", represents pollution. Chihiro upon cleaning him in the bath house where she works, realizes he is the river spirit. This also represents the pollution of Japanese traditions/values as well as Japanese rivers.
Miazaki's other films are either anti-capitalist, pro environment, or dealing with the horror of WWII. I might use Princess Mononoke by the same director because it takes place in feudal Japan or Grave of the Fireflies (same director)about a boy who is 10 and his little sister who is 3. There father has just died in the war and the Americans are still bombimg. The film shows how people are changed by the war-how cruelty is a bi-product of war. The town in which the children live has been bombed, when the children look for their mother, they find her in a pile of dead bodies. They go to live with their aunt who won't feed them because she finds them a burden...she represents the evil that society has created; the children are forced out of the house and eventually the little sister dies of starvation.
The draw of Anime films is escapism and fantasy. But, they also reflect Japanese obsession with stereotypes and gender specific characters. Additionally, almost like with children's toys, girls will not read boys' manga; and vice-versa.

Review by NCTA Teacher Theresa Bradburn:
I originally chose this film because it was animated (anime) and I thought that I would be able to watch it with my children. I didn’t expect to really enjoy it. However, I was wrong. First of all, the images were beautiful. It was fun just to see it, regardless of the story line. Secondly, the story was interesting enough without being too complicated to follow that it kept my full attention. My seven year old daughter was able to get the basic story line but didn’t understand all of the details fully. That did not take away from her enjoyment of the film. Spirited away kind of reminded me of an Allison and Wonderland type movie- but better. I didn’t really like the main character, the little girl, at first. By the end, she had become someone admirable and relatable. This film gave a glimpse into the thinking of the Japanese culture and the interest they have in the spirit world as a means of explaining things in the real world. I also sensed a message about pollution and how it effects the world. This movie showed how certain things can seem to be important even when there are really more important things out there that need to be dealt with-fear of moving to a new place versus life or death. It’s all about perspective. I wonder how much time had truly elapsed in the real world during the girl’s adventure and also how her new life will be. Maybe a sequel will be made?

Review by Mary Albers
In the process of moving to a new home, a young girl named Chihiro becomes trapped in a bizarre fantasy world. Her parents have been transformed into pigs because of their greed. Chihiro is required to find work in a bathhouse where spirits from all over Japan come to rest. She is stripped of her name by the evil witch Yūbaba and faces terrifying experiences as she learns how to live. The movie shows her metamorphosis from a rather typical, bored girl into one with the determination and courage to free herself and her parents.
Spirited Away is the highest grossing film in Japanese box-office history. It is easy to understand why. The animation was intricately and superbly drawn and executed to make this fairy-tale a masterpiece. The plot itself is likewise inventive and takes many surprising twists and turns. (Alice in Wonderland is the closest comparison that comes to mind.) Although the movie is long--over two hours--it is continually refreshing. It is a movie that can be enjoyed by both children and adults.
Recommended ages - all