Nobody Knows Anything

Welcome to Diane Patterson's eclectic blog about what strikes her fancy

Spirited Away: the review

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Date night, date night…date night, date night…

About 10 years ago, Darin went to Japan on a business trip. At the end of that trip, he flew to Detroit to go to MacHack, and he had a stopover in San Francisco International. We were still in the cute phase of our relationship, because I went to the airport and met him in the passenger lounge, where I found him exhausted and not at all looking forward to the next four hour flight, and I gave him a bag of Gummi Savers, which was then his favorite candy snack.

Man. That is saccharine-level cute.

Anyhow, one of the things he brought back from Japan were the complete works of Hayao Miyazaki on laserdisc, which weren’t yet available here in the US: Laputa, Kiki’s Delivery Service, Totoro. We watched them all, in Japanese, and I really enjoyed all of them.

Since then, Miyazaki’s been imported by Disney. There was a big splash a couple of years ago with Princess Mononoke, a film I didn’t particularly enjoy. And now there’s Spirited Away.

Chihiro, a young girl, is moving with her parents away from everything she’s ever known to a new house and a new school, and she is not looking forward to it. On the way to their new house her father takes a “shortcut” and they end up at a strange abandoned theme park. Turns out to be a spirit playground, and when Chihiro’s parents get transmogrified by strange magic, Chihiro has to stay at the bathhouse of the spirits to rescue them.

I liked Spirited Away a whole lot. There’s lots of great visuals (well, it is a Miyazaki movie), and there are some fun-to-watch setpieces. Plot is not Miyazaki’s strong point—for example, early on Chihiro is given a test and is told, “Do this and don’t let the boilerman scare you away or trick you into leaving,” but the actual scene isn’t that much of a confrontation—but I found Spirited Away to be more coherent and accessible than Princess Mononoke.

There are some very gross (as in, “Ewwww”) scenes, and I think the movie is probably too filled with tension for the younger set. Darin and I both agreed that Sophia would be ready to see this movie when she was, say, 15. She would enjoy the premise of this movie—all about kids and grownups!—but there are lots of scenes that are intense in a way that definitely a 3-year-old can’t handle. (Only recently has she been able to handle the scene where Pooh’s tushy gets stuck in Rabbit’s front door.)

The story doesn’t build in a way I’d like, and there are some revelations that seem to come out of left field (like I said, not Miyazaki’s strong point), but there’s some fun stuff in there for adults.

Wacky world

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On so many levels I feel like I’m living in Wacky World. Through the looking glass. You know this feeling—suddenly you’re starring in a Hollywood drama/thriller and you don’t remember auditioning for the part.

On the personal, we’ve got the whole house thing. I’m probably making myself insane over this—the selling, the finding a new place, figuring out what we’re going to do and where we’re going to live in the meantime.

On the beyond personal…I found myself driving down the street today, taking Sophia to dance class, and finding myself fervently praying that she and Simon can grow up in a world where the biggest problem on their plate is figuring out the arrangements for a move. But I don’t think they’re going to. I’ve actually begun to believe that it’s all downhill from here.

No one except Paul Krugman in the NY Times appears to be covering the monumental shithole this administration is digging us into. Another couple hundred million of tax cuts when there’s a goddamn war on? A war that’s going to cost untold billions? Our children are going to be paying for this mess for decades, but Jesus, it’s okay, at least the top 1% got theirs.

Why does Bush have any approval rating whatsoever? Jesus, when they’re tossing off things like this verdammt Halliburton contract? We had seven fucking years of investigations into Whitewater and this shit gets a pass?

Fuckers.

Darin wonders why I’ve started reading books on self-hypnosis. Because I’m a little goddamn tense, dammit.

Someone hose Sean Paul down. He’s insane. (Actually, I think it’s great—it’s where I’m getting most of my news these days. But I’m afraid for his health. How long can he keep this up for? Are London betting shops taking wagers?)

The Oscars

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  • I would have lost the Oscar pool this year. Even though I switched to Chris Cooper for Adaptation, I’m still somewhat surprised by Catherine Zeta-Jones’s award.
  • Anybody who had Adrien Brody cleaned up big.
  • Steve Martin? Pretty damn funny. I’d have him back.
  • Not that it’s any of my business or anything, but, uh…was Jack Nicholson’s date Nicolas Cage?
  • “Every time they give out an Oscar, an agent gets his wings.”
  • You know, it dawns on me only now I should have done a real-time blogging commentary on the Oscars à la The Agonist’s Iraq summary, but a)Sean Paul rocks and b)we TiVo’d the Oscars so we wouldn’t have to watch the whole damn thing.
  • Did they skip Eminem’s song? Or did we fast-forward over that?
  • Whatever induces actors to participate in the roundup of former Oscar winners? Do they get special goodie bags or something?
  • “I handed in a script last year and the studio didn’t change one word. The one word they didn’t change was on page 87.”
  • Trust me, no screenwriters are sitting around debating which is more difficult, an original screenplay or an adaptation. They’re much more concerned about free rewrites and the possessory credit.
  • Well, I missed that one. But I’ve been saying that all night, so who cares. I didn’t have money on this.
  • Wow! Pedro Almodovar! No sop to My Big Fat Greek Wedding! Well, good for him. And good that the Academy is branching out a little.
  • How stoned was Harrison Ford?
  • ROMAN POLANSKI? Oh, that wacky, wacky Academy. And two major awards for The Pianist. Very surprising.
  • You realize this means Michael Douglas can’t scream, “But I’m the one with the Oscar!” in fights any more?