Yubaba rules a world of disembodied beings, enslaves people by stealing their real names, which they eventually forget, and she makes them do "bad things" for her.
The internet is a world of disembodied beings. People post online anonymously or using aliases, putting on a front, saying things and behaving differently from real life.
They forget who they are and do and say bad things.
Only nature in the form of river spirits bursting through the cracks can help you break free from the artificiality of internet culture, but alas, rivers are increasingly more polluted, buried underground, with city streets and roads over them. We barely remember them too. We need to save them so they can save us.
It was about internet culture
I read somewhere that Miyazaki intended it to be a commentary on Japan's rampant child prostitution problem, and I can definitely see that what with the MC losing her parents to mindless consumerism (i.e. becoming pigs) and being forced to make a living servicing "yokai" in a "bathhouse". Her prostitute name "Sen" references this too, meaning "1 thousand" in Japanese as though it were her rate. The sludge monster she has to "bathe" is a particularly gross client, and No-Face embodies the "noble pedophile" who's clingy but well-meaning, and who attempts to bribe Sen into sexual favours only to reel in his advances for the sake of not harming her. There's also that not-so-subtle pregnancy metaphor with the giant baby, and there's probably some more stuff I didn't pick up on.
Chihiro's parents are paypigs. It all makes sense now.
why do bugs like fucking children so much?
I didn't really see a story there. The MC is the moderate mature person from the beginning. She urges her parents not to eat the food but they still do. Then she has to take responsible for them which she does. She spends the entire time looking for a way to free her parents. In the end it just happens.
I read somewhere
Form your own thoughts for once.
"it's about internet culture"
released in 2001
moron
internet didn't exists 2001
moron
My observations and interpretations are all my own, but they were influenced by views Miyazaki has expressed in interviews, like his distaste for consumerism and the sex industry.
Showed Spirited Way to my sister when she was young and she loved it. But in her teens she read some lady's tumblr blog espousing a retarded theory that the bathhouse is actually a brothel, and No-Face is a pedophile ghost, and all this other nonsense that is easily debunked.
I tried telling her the main theme is about identity (Chihiros name is taken and given the new name which is just a number; No-Face steals other peoples identities, etc...), and the bathhouse is a about cleaning and purifying, not sin. But my sister cannot unsee that tumblr theory every time we watch it. Sad.
Those observations are not your own, I've seen them in every thread about Spirited Away. It's on the same level as "Ed, Edd and Eddy takes place in hell!".
Oh hey you're one of those tumblr retards I was talking about here .
There's also that not-so-subtle pregnancy metaphor with the giant baby
How the FUCK are you this dense. Even child me knew it was about an overbearing mother who wouldnt let her son grow up.
Its literally a manchild
It's basically about capitalism so you are like half correct.
It's bad but the point is not it's bad. Miyazaki wanted to make a story about kids being able to suvrive in it.
Miyazaki intended it to be a commentary on Japan's rampant child prostitution problem
absolute state of gaijin brain
muh capitalism
Go be a child in Cuba or NK and see how it goes.
whataboutism
Judaism
Why do you say that to me? Miyazaki was a literal commie, not me
Miyazaki basically said that No-Face represents guys who have no life and don't know what to do so doing nothing but wandering around
But Suzuki, the chairman and producer of studio ghibli, said it's a self-insert of Miyazaki
Both can be true.
No-Face represents guys who have no life and don't know what to do
If you need an 20 minute long explanation of this:
youtube.com
kys
The internet did in fact exist before residents of Bombay started getting it. In fact, Japan was a very early adopter.
No. Did you actually watch this trash?
Go back to Anon Babble
Couldn't tell you because I haven't been in any Spirited Away threads. I watched it last summer with my 13-year-old niece under the vague assumption I'd taken online (whether from Miyazaki himself or otherwise) that it was about child prostitution and I put the pieces together as I went along. Sure it's a popular interpretation and I was aware of that at the time, but the observations I noted are my own and I'm not ripping them directly from anywhere.
Interpretations of an author's work are only valid insofar as they are corroborated by the work itself. There's no single, correct interpretation, but interpretations that make more sense within the context of the work are stronger. Although you can weaken it by pointing out its flaws, there's no way you can "debunk" the child prostitution interpretation even if Miyazaki himself came out and said it wasn't true, because it's a solid interpretation congruent with the story's themes and characters. Even if you're willing to accept the author's interpretation as the only correct one I'd still find it difficult to believe that someone with as many gripes about Japan as Miyazaki, who has previously played with themes of commercialization and childlike innocence, wouldn't use his movies to air his grievances about Japan's human trafficking problem and it's devaluation of children. Criticise the conclusions the theory comes to, offer an alternate, potentially stronger interpretation (as you have), or just call it retarded; It'll ultimately persist if it's logically sound and coherent (as I and its adherents find it to be).
If anything Tumblr faggots are against the human trafficking theory because they think it's espoused solely for shock value, and any interpretations that go against the wholesome family-friendly fun of Ghibli movies aren't permissible (see picrel). Don't slap a label on me to justify shitting on my interpretation when you can just shit on my interpretation normally.
I came up with this theory all by myself without hearing about it from the Internet but I've same images online to defend it.
not even remotely in the way it does now, dipshit.
That image still proves the theory is from tumblr.
A fucking river
Even if you're willing to accept the author's interpretation as the only correct one
I was following you until this part. If an author wants to leave something open for interpretation then that's one thing, but if he comes out in favor of an interpretation or straight out gives you the interpretation then it's settled. Sure, I don't know that Miyazaki has done that so you can still support the child prostitution theory and the rest of your points stands, but death of the author theory is going too far.
...under the vague assumption I'd taken online ... that it was about child prostitution...
Sure it's a popular interpretation... but the observations I noted [in my post] are my own
Not claiming I invented the theory, just that I was vaguely aware of the conclusion others came to before I watched the movie, and I thought that same conclusion made sense when I finished watching it.
Also the image is just there to shit on Tumblrinas, not to defend the interpretation.
specifically the ten-year-old daughters of some friends he invited to stay at his vacation home
He made the movie for underage prostitutes?
Yes, 10-year-old prostitutes.
I know the movie better than the directors
There's a reason his protagonists are so often lolis with plenty of gratuitous panty shots
mystery meat troon faggot using band dork meme humor to use pop culture as a cudgel to bitch about unrelated politics
Americans and their wacky theories... Why can't you just enjoy a film? You're like babies that need everything explained to them.
But that wasn't a sludge monster. It was a nice spirit who was cursed and trapped in the sludge. She saves it. It's like you haven't seen it in 20 years.
symbolism in fiction and its analysis is an American invention
Are you retarded? Do they not teach literature in Delhi?
you can debunk the childhood prostitution interpretation because its retarded
the sludge monster was a water spirit that was polluted. he went to the bath house to be purified. he lost his identity as a water spirit.
People post online anonymously or using aliases, putting on a front, saying things and behaving differently from real life
20 years ago maybe but today people make porn site accounts with their real names
take some absolutely retarded viewpoint
start looking at something through that lens
SEE IT LINES UP!
Princess Mononoke has more soul. This might be 2nd best.
Whisper of the Heart is best for me, with Mononoke at second place.
Yes it did, shitfuck.
People post online anonymously or using aliases
The moment people stopped doing this and started treating the internet like real life is when everything went to shit. Now you have almost two whole generations growing up thinking the internet is real when it's all pure concentrated bullshit to sell ad space.
This film makes no fucking sense. It only exists to show off its nice animation
Panty shots
Not in ghibli movies, you little pedo you.
People post online anonymously or using aliases, putting on a front, saying things and behaving differently from real life.
They forget who they are and do and say bad things.
This is the worst argument for mainstream social media I've ever read. Take your overrated Reddit-tier wholesome chungus anime film and shove it up your asshole. Your essay is garbage.
he doesnt know
Whisper is the objective best in terms of both animation and narrative. I like Porco Rosso personally though.
There are like a dozen examples from Kiki's alone
I hate the way this is being framed.
No, Spirited Away ISN'T some hunky-dory innocent movie from your childhood that's apparently REALLY all about child-whores being fucked by monsters but ONLY if you know about some secret symbolic code or whatever crap like that.
But if you actually sit down, as an adult, and watch the movie, in its original Japanese form (which is actually super fucking important here, as the English script and dubbing is an absolute hackjob close to Warriors of the Wind in faithfulness to the original despite being handled by dudes from Pixar who ought to know better) you should be able to pretty clearly see how strongly focused the movie is on portraying various kinds of exploitation in numerous forms, and how it naturally touches on things that do relate to child exploitation specifically.
Like, it really doesn't need to be interpreted as "OMG, ZOINKERS this innocent children's movie is secretly REALLY about SEX, watch my channel to see why" style bullshit, because the way that No-Face/Kaonash is clearly infatuated with Sen/Chihiro and slowly driven insane by what he perceives as her rejection of him is something that doesn't need theorizing about, you can simply watch and see it happening if you pay the slightest attention (and again, are not watching it in English, which I have to point out again because a number of Ghili films have solid dub jobs in contrast with this). The whole movie doesn't need to be "really about a whore house" specifically for the themes it's dealing with to tie in with and enhance its plot in a naturally compelling way.
It is a fantastic movie that is all the more dramatic to watch when you simply look at what it's exploring.
No, he didn't go there to be cleansed. He went there to get dirtier (as per child prostitution theory).