Spirited Away (Sen to Chihiro no kamikakushi )

The good: overabundance of creativity
The bad: lame ending
Its rare to see a japanese film being recognized in the academy awards. Blame it on the still apparent discrimination agaisnt animated films of foreign origin. While they go about handing awards to mediocre animation like the incredibles, they ignore deliberately all those from the other side of the pond. But this isnt supposed to be a complain-complain post so I'll get to the film.

Spirited Away blew audiences away with its splendid animation beauty, its superbly crafted story, its level of detail and creativity and amazing sense of exploration. It finally put a Japanese anime film into the pedestal of the aforementioned awards body by winning the oscar for best animated film back in 2002 (i think).

This studio ghibli film from director hayao miyazaki chronicles the events that chihiro, a ordinary girl, witnessed and experienced during a chance trip into a otherworldy setting. She soon finds out that the world she has trespassed into is full of mystery, adventure, character, and for anime virgins, weirdness. Her parents, for example, get turned into pigs when they ate food from that strange realm. She then sets out in finding a way to survive in this world while simultaneously finding a cure for her parents.

Breathtaking is simply the right word to describe this film. The level of creativity bubbling from every scene is downright staggering! This film will bring out the best in every person's creative mind. And its not all art either, the story is simple but sweet. It doesnt babble on serious themes like other studio ghibli films but rather celebrates this world. True, the setting of the story is on another realm, but it is clear that the exagerrated potrayal of its environs is a reference to our own world, with all its beauty and variety. Those who are open-minded enough to try an animated film which doesnt rely on boring humor and 3d generated visuals would be stupid to pass off this classic of an anime. (5/5)

*Fun Fact: Back in '02, Spirited Away not only won the oscar for best animated film but also won all the categories in which it was nominated including best film in the Annie awards - the animation equivalent of the grammys for music. Its currently top 39 in the IMDB top 250 best films of all time.