Forum - View topicREVIEW: Paprika
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GATSU
Posts: 15550 |
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Just as I imagined, ANS says Paprika got an R for "violent and sexual images". Methinks it's the sexual part which was the deciding factor.
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unhealthyman
 Posts: 306 |
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I figured this thread was still recent enough for a bump and I just wanted to my 2 cents to the whole Paprika discussion.
I was lucky enough to see it in one of the only 4 cinema showings that will (most likely) ever happen in the UK. It showed over the weekend just gone as part of the Leeds International Film Festival (UK) and I have to say it was totally amazing. Most of what I want to say has already been said in the reviews earlier, but I would probably agree whole heartedly with the full A+ ratings it got. (although I would definitely like to rewatch it to make sure  .)
Satoshi Kon genuinely makes anime that transcends the usual expectations and Paprika is no different. It is rather uncompromising on the whole and at first, although effective on a scene by scene basis remains pretty erudite. Yet it still has some of the most powerful scenes I have ever seen, I had goosebumps at many scenes (often thanks to the truly awesome music provided by Susumu Hirasawa,) which have stayed with me long after the showing. And as the film progresses, it all ties together in the classic Satoshi Kon way (thinking back to moments in Perfect Blue where it seems random or puzzling until all becomes clear.) To say that it is like a tour de force of his other films is also accurate, as you can easily pick out aspects of Millennium Actress, Paranoia Agent and Perfect Blue that appear again in the film. However it never seems derivative. My only possible criticisms are about a few of the sci-fi elements which I felt detracted a bit from the overall story and that the reasonably typical grand ending may not be to all peoples tastes. Overall, yet another film from Satoshi Kon worthy of acclaim. I thoroughly enjoyed it and can't wait to see it again. (In fact I am seriously considering importing the OST when it gets released just because I have to experience some of the songs again. The mixture of the music and the animation where spoiler[ Paprika dives into the communal dream for the first time] totally blew me away.) |
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GATSU
Posts: 15550 |
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So I liked it, but I didn't quite love it. (With the exception of Hirasawa-sensei's music, of course.) To be fair, I missed about the first 10 minutes, thanks to the wonders of the labyrinth that is Downtown L.A. But in general, Paprika's like being on acid while staring at the left-overs of Paranoia Agent after they've been tossed into a blender. I guess if you want me to summarize the film, think, "A Nightmare on Elm Street" for otaku. Lots of pretty effects and freaky imagery, but little depth to make up for the psycho-babble. I definitely don't agree on Justin's take that this is on the same level as Princess Mononoke, since that film took some time to flesh out the characters, while Paprika just feels rushed.
It needs more suspense and mystery, and less of the kitchen sink approach for padding out the story. |
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Shonen Bat
 Posts: 382 |
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[quote="GATSU"]Samurai:
Yup. Understand the religion that is "Evangelism." Looks like Haruhiism has its own rival in anime religion.
Oh, L. Ron Hubbard, praise be ye. Just hope Tom Cruise doesn't sue me if he sees that just like how he sued South Park. Has he ever sued kids? Partically 15 year old kids?
Kon's stuff was pretty popular before Paranoia Agent(Although I believe Paranoia Agent is definatly Kon's best work). Saying that his stuff became popular just becuase of one show is like saying Miyazaki's only popular becuase of Spirited Away. Anyway I just saw the trailer for this and I must say it looks really good. But then again I've enjoyed Kon's films very much and expect a lot of good things from him. Can't wait to see this. |
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Andrez
 Posts: 67 Location: Tokyo |
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You can find a review of the film on our de-VICE site, which was published in the Yomiuri Shimbun newspaper yesterday - just hit here:
http://de-vice-2.tripod.com
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GATSU
Posts: 15550 |
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Wow, Justin. Your review made it to Rotten Tomatoes. Congrats.
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mini-dukes
 Posts: 13 Location: Tokyo, Japan |
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Wonderful review, and quite right. I saw Millenium Actress at the Big Apple Anime Festival years ago, and had seen Perfect Blue before that. I then proceeded to see and own eveything Kon touched. I can't wait to see this.
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GATSU
Posts: 15550 |
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I had to upgrade my rating for Paprika, because, while you can miss the first 10-15 minutes off most films and still get an idea of what you're watching, I can't say the same for this film. Plus the piss-poor speaker equipment[Delta can back me up on that one.
] at that Downtown theater I saw Paprika in further diminished the experience. In spite of cribbing material from Kurosawa, Mononoke, and even Urotsukidoji, Paprika still manages to be a unique Kon adventure which succeeds even without the acid trip. Part of what makes it work is its balance of drama and humour which was sorely lacking in Tokyo Godfathers, and which seemed to swing more to the former approach rather than the latter one in Paranoia Agent. I.E., Tokyo Godfathers couldn't decide whether it was a comedy or drama, and Paranoia Agent took itself too seriously at times. The visuals enhance the unreality of the settings, while the cultural elements(national and disposable) add a sense of wonder and enchantment you don't see from enough films-live-action or anime.) My score is now closer to an A-, and probably would rank higher if the characters weren't slightly exaggerated-but not as much so as in his last two productions. Best anime I've seen in a long time, followed closely by Tokikake.
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mrgazpacho
Posts: 316 Location: Australia |
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Wasn't DKL going to add an in-depth review here?
Paprika screened last night at the Sydney FIlm Festival, to a sold-out audience. I think most of them were seasoned Kon fans (the blatant fanservice in the last 10 seconds caused a ripple of appreciative murmuring) I think it's quite a rounded film. There wasn't the relentless focus on paranoia and deliberate attempts to obfuscate reality that was present in Perfect Blue. The multiple switches of vantage point and perception as the focus moved from character to character were an evolutionary step from Millennium Actress. And the nature of the main character's nurturing instincts could even be said to harken back to Tokyo Godfathers. The use of "recurring scenes" was a device that also harkens back to previous productions, but in this case the very fact that dream recall therapy was central to the film made the effect very natural. I've never really been one to follow specific seiyuu, but I can see why fanboys worship Hayashibara. She is excellent here. And she gets a chance to show off by portraying two different personalties in the one movie. |
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DKL
 Posts: 1962 Location: California, USA |
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Already did... on another board... but... uhh... man, it was a mess... but I'll post it anyway (subject to interpretation change should I even see this again... yeah... I'm not comepletely confident with this given that someone was moaning half way through the movie... for like 20 minutes or something... I think the person was mentally handicapped... how they got in?... I don't know... all things considering, it was a strange experience to have during this specific movie)
================================ Satoshi Kon’s Paprika. Okay… so, with this viewed, the only major Madhouse production I need to somehow see this year is Piano Forest… but, since that’s probably not happening, I’ll just assume that this year rounds off with Paprika. Adapted from a story written by Yasutaka Tsutsui, this is the second one this year after the vague sequel (supposedly), The Girl who Leapt Through Time. If I were to find some kind of similarity between both works, it would probably be: “Science fiction, not necessarily in a science fiction setting.” Okay, let’s walk through the story and some general interpretation… spoiler[The story starts out with this chick, Paprika, helping out this police dude who’s having this nightmare about a bunch of crime busts gone wrong (which is sort of getting in the way of some crime bust in real life). So, after she sort of helps guide the police guy out of the nightmare and after giving him some general interpretation of his dream (which are actually dreams about movies), she leaves her calling card and dances off into the night (complete with untranslated credits… perfect… why the hell didn’t Sony put subs on that again?). Anyway, some stuff happens and we later find out that Paprika is actually some… scientist chick named Atsuko Chiba on her way back to the lab. When she finally gets back, she meets this over-weight dude stuck in the elevator, Dr. Tokita (who has apparently created the DC Mini, the device that allows you to jump into people’s dreams). After getting him out of the elevator, the subject of the apparent theft of some DC Minis comes about and Dr. Chiba heads over to some room for a meeting with the company Chairman, who points out that, while the devices might indeed help in the field of psychology, it violates the sacred realm of people’s dreams… and then some other preachy stuff about how technology doesn’t leave anything sacred anymore (in other words, he was totally pointing himself out as the suspect, which I’ll go into later). Before the conversation can get wrapped up, the old scientist dude with Chiba and the chairperson starts spouting some baffling nonsense and ends up taking a jump outside a window; he gets saved by some tree branch that catches him outside, but at this point, it’s safe to assume that whoever stole the DC Minis (all 3 of them) has now begun to start using it for… devious things. And thus the investigation starts. Some speculation happens and the crew (composed of Tokita, Osanai *was that his name? Well, that dude who sort of looks like Maniwa from Paranoia Agent*, old scientist guy *after he gets saved from the “surreal parade” nightmare* and Chiba) eventually manages to finger a suspect in the form of the DC Mini’s co-creator… uhh… what’s his face… the guy who was best friends with Tokita. So yeah, they go around looking for him and, at one point, Chiba is saved from taking the fall (off of an apartment balcony). So… uhh… some more stuff happens and Chiba eventually dives back in with the police dude only to find out that the “surreal parade” that Tokita’s scientist friend supposedly started has now begun strolling through other people’s dreams (people that aren’t involved with the lab, I mean). This is becoming a problem and the crew now realizes that they have to put an end to all this before it (the “surreal parade”) starts invading other people. But, before this further investigation can happen, the use of DC Minis is banned by the chairman (which was probably some roundabout way to get people off of his ass); this ends up killing any further growth in the investigation and Chiba and her running crew are forced to investigate further behind the chairperson’s back. After some more dream investigation stuff (especially now that Tokita has been swallowed up as well… but he managed to find the truth about how his friend wasn't behind the nightmare in the process), Chiba finds out that the person behind everything was someone with some kinda huge delusion… it was the chairman dude (unsurprisingly) and that… he had some kinda lapdog in the form of Osanai (also unsurprisingly). Also, the "surreal parade" is apparently composed of several dreams "stolen" from other delusional people (or something like that). So, some more stuff happens and it’s up to the cop dude to wake Chiba from the nightmare (all the while trying to settle his conflicts with his early adulthood). Some more stuff happens and Chiba eventually defeats the evil chairperson and brings the world (which was tiptoeing at the brink of insanity due to the dream world and the real world being merged together) back to order; all the while, we learn of this hidden relationship between Tokita and Chiba. And everything ends happily.] As unorganized as that sounds… that’s it. So, as far as what my gut is telling me, the way in which Paprika was done was pretty much what the last episode of Paranoia Agent would be if it was more fleshed out (than it already was) and operating at a movie-level production budget. Particularly, you have this one character, police-dude, who has some kind of on-going conflict that’s presented in the opening, and it’s eventually interwoven with the bigger picture given that his background allows him to spoiler[be able to save Dr. Chiba later on in the movie. Police dude is interesting (regardless of the fact that I can’t seem to remember his name off of the bat). So, he has some kind of on-going conflict that was re-awaken due to the fact that his current homicide case reminded him of his earlier days in which he aspired to be some kind of hit movie filmmaker; he denies interest in movies most of the time, but it’s only because he doesn’t want to remember the pain of having given up on an ambitious dream of his at one point (he even quit on trying to pursue the film-making college that he got into). But, because of his role as a hero in Chiba’s dreams, this revived interest brings him to a realization at the end of the movie (which I’ll talk about later). Another interesting point is probably Dr. Chiba and Dr. Tokita’s relationship; I didn’t see that coming… Even better was the fact that it was actually really touching. So, what’s happening is that, at first, I was under the impression that Dr. Chiba was completely appalled by Dr. Tokita’s “otaku-ness” (especially during that one part of the movie where she expands on her disgust and completely blows up in Tokita’s face)… but, it turns out that the only reason why she wanted him to grow up was because she wanted to be with him; when you’re a kid… you usually only think about kid things.] I guess my favorite aspect is how the ideas were pretty much melded into the visuals; man, did Madhouse deliver with this one… the opening sequence with the ringmaster demonstrated such finesse, grace and this really high degree mastery in key animation… it was beautiful; visually, this has got to be Kon’s best. And, while one of my fears going in was that I might be irked by the use of 3D… the thing is, during most of the movie, it was really hard for me to find most of it (I mean, aside from the use of texture mapping or whatever); I was impressed that they kept it on the down-low. I mean, it was a little more than obvious in Kawajiri’s movie, but it wasn’t at all here; if this is Kon’s idea of using “3D,” then I’m all for it. Okay, I guess the only problem with the plot was the fact that I was able to spoiler[tag the Chairman and Osanai down as suspects almost immediately (well, Osanai made it more obvious later on when he revealed his jealousy outright)… I was like, “man, can it be any more obvious?” This was a little surprising given that one of the focal charms of Kon’s work was the sheer unpredictability; this was definitely a step-back in that regard. Though, I have to admit that I didn’t know that the chairman was having delusions of actually taking over the world; I was under the impression that he was one of those types who was like “anti-technology” or whatever and that he wanted to do away with all the “l33t 3vil-ness”… but, I guess his delusion makes sense since he’s like… old and confined to a wheelchair (you could literally see his delusion when he stood up from his chair for the first time in the movie). I was probably most fond of the stuff at the end of the movie; how the dream world and the real world overlapping was done was really fun to watch (I liked the cell phones taking pictures of schoolgirl panties). And, like I said, the relationship between Chiba and Tokita genuinely surprising (and toching). And how the movie wraps up in regards to that made sense as well. Given that Chiba spent most of her time looking at other people’s dreams, it got to a point where she managed to lose sight of her own dream; she was finally able to dream her own dream by the end. ALSO, given that Chiba’s dream was something that was actually based in reality, she was able to defeat the evil company chairman, whose dream was only based in some overblown delusion; what Kon is probably trying to say is: regardless of the scale of a dream, reality almost always takes precedence and that we shouldn’t forget that. BUT, much like how police-dude’s thing wrapped up, we mustn’t forget WHY dreams are there to begin with; they give us direction… after all, police-dude only became a police dude because of his dabbling in the fine art of low-budget student films.] But yeah… overall, Paprika was a nice little insight into Kon’s perception of the Otaku lifestyle that plagues Japan (and poor souls such as myself). I REALLY liked this movie… probably my favorite work of his (though, people must take note of the fact that Millenium Actress is actually my least favorite, in the context of the amount of “entertainment” I got, not necessarily the level of insight that was conveyed in the movie… and, in my case, entertainment takes precedence over insight). So, that’s it… Naturally, my interpretation might change if I ever see this again… =================== Hell... I don't even remember the names. But yeah, I really liked it. |
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TheVok
Posts: 613 Location: North York, Ontario, Canada |
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Here it's PG (go Canada!), but that might be a bit too soft. I saw it on Thursday and it's more 14A/PG-13 territory .... |
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Pepperidge
 Posts: 1106 Location: British Columbia, Canada |
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I don't think the rating was too inappropriate. I was actually starting to get a bit concerned that the Canadian ratings council(s) were shifting more towards American standards with sexuality being more harshly criticized than violence. They've traditionally taken the opposite stance, but I was really taken aback when an extremely violent film like Pan's Labyrinth got off with a 14A, and Pirates 3 got a PG despite its enormous body count. Meanwhile, some films that don't even depict sex seem to be getting 18A ratings. PG seemed fairly appropriate for Paprika. The only problem is that a lot of family movies do get PG ratings in Canada, which may throw some people off... but frankly, most of those films should've gotten G ratings to begin with. |
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mrgazpacho
Posts: 316 Location: Australia |
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Thanks for those thoughts. 
I think I agree with most of your interpretations, although I think the comments on the Otaku lifestyle weren't really that strong. Of course the phone camera scene was funny and Himuro's mess of a house was interesting... I think there's a little leeway in interpreting exact plot points (especially to do with character motiviations not depicted explicitly on-screen), but none of it feels out of joint. |
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thegoanna
Posts: 35 Location: Roxby Downs, Australia |
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I have just seen the DVD version of this movie..
I was cruising Blockbuster and there it was.. sitting on the shelf.. an anime I had not seen or even heard of!!.. A quick check on the story was enough to raise my interest.  and so out the shop it went 
I dont worry to much about directors, actors or other such things, the movie is what counts. Correction I have watched it twice.. the second time to catch up on the stuff that slipped passed the first time!! (that happens with age, also subtitles on was also a help!) Well I thought it was an intersting presentation on dreams and what they mean to people, and there were some strange dreams here! The story moved quite well, fast even! with a few twists and turns, (with them a movie is not much anyway). So first viewing was.. Hmmmmmm..... OK..  !! 
Second viewing was.. OK I get it all now!! Well it was an interesting couple of hours, and.. yes I actually liked it! So there!
Cheers to all..
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