Wednesday, 23 September 2009

Paprika: Film Review

Title: Paprika
Directed by: Satoshi Kon
Written by: Yasutaka Tsutsui
Year: 2006



It may be difficult for me to give an account of the work of Satoshi Kon without lapsing into hyperbole and hero-worship, but it will be good exercise for my objective muscles so lets have a go.

The basic outline of Paprika may seem deceptively simple; a medical institute have developed a machine, the DC mini, which allows dreams to be seen on a monitor and recorded, and also enables people to interface with the dream, literally placing themselves into the patient’s dreamscape. The inventor of the device, Kohsaku Tokita, imagines the wonders of being able to share in a friend’s dream, and also understands the medical and therapeutic breakthroughs the new technology could enable. Anyone familiar with Kon’s often dark plots will be able to pre-empt that all will not go as planned.

At the very beginning of the film several copies of the DC mini have gone missing, and very soon all psychedelia breaks loose. Madness is infecting the members of the institute where the DC mini was created, as the missing technology is being used to broadcast the dream of a mentally unstable patient into the minds of others, which is visualised using the, now iconic, parade; a noisy and frenetic convoy of insanity thinly disguised as jubilation.

The titular Paprika, then, is the dream-exploring alter ego of Atsuko Chiba, a psychologist working in the aforementioned institute, who attempts to provide therapy more effectively by experiencing the patient’s dreams alongside them. Needless to say, when the chaotic dream begins to leak out, it is Paprika who is best placed to combat the situation.

The film was marketed in the Western world with the tagline: “This is your brain on anime”, a parody of the 1987/88 anti-drugs campaign, likely due to the, for some, confusing nature of the film (I refrain from the phrase head-fuck), and the heavy use of frenetic psychedelic imagery. This is perhaps a strange choice, as the ‘drugs’ of the original campaign are depicted as damaging, thus you would expect the ‘anime’, placed in the same category, to also be damaging, although to be fair they were likely playing on the retro feel of the reference, hoping to gain publicity from that alone. This criticism of the tagline may seem slightly unnecessary, and of little consequence to the actual film, which is a fair point, however if I am to portray a positive and a negative side to the film, that is how far I have to grope for aspects I am dissatisfied with.

The film plays heavily on the line between dreams and the real world, for want of better terminology, constantly blurring the distinction between the two, and falling back on the old pull back and reveal technique. Overuse of the pull back and reveal would usually suggest a lack of innovation, and at times Paprika skates frighteningly close to being a parody of the “and then I woke up” story that you are forbidden to write as a child. However, Paprika manages to utilise this technique sparingly, and to great effect, perhaps aided by the slick visuals, with the change from dream to reality playing out in one scene as a layer of scenery is sucked into a vacuum, revealing the real world behind.

The film is wonderfully crafted with almost infinite examples of a deft artistic touch and, strangely for a writer and director that has such a long history of serious and dark subject matter, exquisite comedic timing. It is perhaps unsurprising that Paprika has some genuinely humorous moments, although actually laughing aloud may simply be evidence of my increasingly twisted humour, as a film which is so heavily invested in psychosis has its fair share of genuinely insane dialogue. In the examples where manic senseless dialogue occurs, the film wavers between the instant humour that can be derived from absolutely nonsense utterances, and the inevitable horror to follow, as these verbal explosions are precursors to complete mental breakdown. The example I have chosen to illustrate this is from the very first instance where it occurs, where a Doctor involved with the DC mini’s use exclaims:

“This whole festival was put together by thirty third-graders with lots of chutzpah and panda!”

before proceeding to jump of out of the nth floor window.

The characters are all fantastically designed, where the somewhat surprising difference of style between certain characters should jar, but in fact it stands up well, and effectively emphasizes the difference between them. It is likely that this occurs due to the film relying heavily on a suspension of disbelief, where if you are willing to accept that a dream can be entered and manipulated through the use of technology, accepting that a certain character is ludicrously overweight is less of an obstacle. But oh! How overweight. It wouldn’t be presumptuous to suggest that Mr Kon was really trying to make a point when designing Tokita, a man not only obscenely obese, but also strangely out of proportion with the rest of the characters, in the same way as toys often are (Spiderman and Mr Sinister were never meant to battle, and were a constant source of annoyance to me as a child).

The foul design of Tokita, whose bloated neck floats out further than his jaw, is counterbalanced by the slick power-dressing of Atsuko, and further by the casual indie-chic of Paprika. It is, however, in the backgrounds where the meticulous detail can be discovered. In particular, the parade scene is so detailed and busy that there a million and one pop culture references that may be being made, where brief bursts of recognition (there’s the Statue of Liberty!) are counterbalanced by the interminable frenzied march. There can be no doubt that these references are being made however, as Paprika briefly appears as Son Goku astride a cloud, from whichever incarnation of Journey to the West you would recognise that character from, and later appearing as Tinkerbell, although it is just as likely she is merely a archetypal fairy-character. More direct references to Kon’s other works are made, for the sort of fanboys who would enjoy that sort of thing (i.e. ME), where a cinema complex at the end features posters of Millenium Actress, Perfect Blue and Tokyo Godfathers. Similarly I had to wonder whether Paprika skipping ephemerally through the cityscape over the opening credits was an homage to the sort of skipping done in the climactic scenes of Perfect Blue, where if it isn’t it hints to a skipping-based obsession held by Satoshi Kon.

Alongside the psychedelic imagery that the film is most-likely known for, there are examples, with one butterfly scene in particular in mind, of deeply disturbing shudder-inducing visceral horror. The film really should feel busier than it does, as a piece including horror, psycho-thriller, psychedelia and occasional comedy shouldn’t be able to fuse comfortably, but Paprika seems to have achieved this fusion.

I was able to follow the story fairly comfortably on this viewing, though I have seen the film before. As this was a second (or perhaps third) viewing, I decided to view the film with the English dub, for as any pretentious anime purist/elitist knows, first viewings are in Japanese with subtitles if this option is available. Now I have no abiding memory of the Japanese voice acting, which would suggest that it was good, and by viewing the cast list, Hayashibara Megumi in the lead role, I can’t imagine that it was anything less than a stellar performance (this is criticism at its cutting edge). The English dub, however, is another matter completely.

It would seem unfair and reductive to criticise the voice acting by declaring that Paprika’s voice was annoying, but it was. Looking back on my notes I have actually written that her voice “makes me angry”. Apologies to Cindy Robinson, who will never work again now that she has suffered the death knoll of Animated Opinions' criticism. On the other hand, she also voiced Atsuko, and the voice she assumed for this role caused no irritation. It is simply possible that the ultra-cutesy style with which Paprika speaks works comfortably in Japanese, where there is a heavily trodden tradition of the cute, but English-language archetypal cutesy voiced characters merely cause irritation, and seem false and vacuous. On a, very tenuously, related note, one American-accented extra pronounces paella “pie-ay-ah”, which is a new one on me, and simply will not do. Unless of course my understood pronunciation of “pie-ell-ah” is incorrect, in which case: sorry America.

My final gripe, then, is the occasional example of blatantly expository dialogue. It would be interesting to see whether this is present in the original Japanese, but having too much information explicitly stated somewhat dulls the film, and patronises the audience, especially when the audience is as clever as I am. One example has Atsuko suggest that an elderly injured Doctor stay in hospital, as the meeting to cancel the project involving the DC mini needs to involve every member to be passed, with the Doctor himself then stating something along the lines of: “If I stay here, the meeting can’t go ahead!” which I greeted with a slow shake of my head and mild chagrin.

It is necessary to have it known that I have perhaps overcompensated with the negatives on this film, as I was afeard that I would drown the production under the flood of my enjoyment. The film is a thought-provoking, gripping and dark story, animated and depicted ingeniously, and backed with the experimental electronica of Hirasawa Susumu. Paprika is a continuation of the collaboration between Kon and Hirasawa that has been so successful in the past, and there are a number of standout tracks in the Paprika soundtrack, in particular ‘The Girl in Byakkoya’ and ‘Parade’, though to be fair the entire film is wonderfully scored.

Boiled down, what can be expected of Paprika is what can be expected from any other Satoshi Kon piece, enjoyment for your ears, popping of your eyes and an initial boggling of your mind, followed by its expansion.

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