Spirited Away directed by Hayao Miyazaki

Spirited Away, a film written and directed by Hayao Miyazaki, was a phenomenal film, not only from my childhood but from many others as well. It opened in theatres on September 20th, 2001 and was released on DVD April 15th, 2003. The budget of Spirited Away was an estimate of around 18 million US dollars. Spirited Away was voiced by the main cast led by: Daveigh Chase as Chihiro, Jason Marsden as Haku, Suzanne Pleshette as Yubaba, Susan Egan as Lin, Tara Strong as Baby Boh, Micheal Chiklis as Chihiro's father, and Lauren Holly as Chihiro's Mother.

Spirited Away is a classic family film that opens up at the scene of a 10 year-old girl named Chihiro sitting in the back seat of her family's car as her father is traveling the back roads towards the house her family recently purchased. The path that her father takes is soon obstructed by a blocked tunnel; Chihiro is creeped out by the statue blocking the path and doesn’t want to leave the car but is forced to as her parents step out to have a look around. When they pass to the other side of the tunnel, they discover on what seems to be an old abandoned amusement park. Chihiro is further disturbed and pleads to go back to the car, but her parents smell fresh food from an empty food stall and they sit down as they start to eat the food from the stall. A few moments after eating the food, Chihiro's parents turn into pigs causing Chihiro to freak out and flee. As she is running away, it becomes dark and the amusement park appears not to be abandoned anymore, this time it is inhabited by spirits and mythical creatures. A boy named Haku happens to see Chihiro as she runs past him, he follows her and helps her hide from the spirits explaining certain spirits would try to eat her if they saw her. She learns that the place she is in is a spirit resort where spirits come to rest and relax. Haku befriends Chihiro after she explains her situation to him and he agrees to help her turn her parents back into humans. He tells her to ask for work at the bath house in the mean time, making it easier for him to protect her from malicious spirits. He also explains two important rules to Chihiro about her stay in the underworld: She must work, laziness is not acceptable, and she must take on the name of Sen to hide. She must not forget her real name or she will never leave the spirit world. Chihiro and Haku then try to find a way to turn her parents back into humans before it is too late, as Chihiro hides and works in the bath house.

Spirited Away is one of the greatest qualities of Animated films, its quality is one to be presumed of generosity and love. By the meaning of generosity and love, Hayao Miyazaki carefully hand-draws each frame at a time. Miyazaki adds complexity to his animations when animation is usually simple; he gives detail to the backgrounds while giving space for his art to blend. Miyazaki gives an whelming amount of attention on each frame, with all frames spanning into 129 minutes of run time. Each frame is only enhanced by the computer graphics, the bedrock of is his handwork. "We take handmade cell animation and digitize it in order to enrich the visual look, but everything starts with the human hand-drawing." Miyazaki explains on his work.

The voice portrayal of characters in Spirited Away were hosted by Disney. The English dubbed version of the movie fit the characters looks; the voices were not off by sound and tone, they showed emotion that matched the characters expressions. English Dubbing of a foreign movie is usually monotone and flat but Disney did a great pick of its voice actors for Spirited Away.

Spirited Away was a great movie from my childhood and from others as well. The movie was created on a budget of around 18 million US dollars but reached a box office of $9,855,615. Many audiences alike claim that this was a childhood classic that was warm-hearted, meaningful, and tear jerking at some parts in the movie. It scored a high 98% on the Critics, Rotten Tomato's and a high 96% from the audience and I believe the rating of this movie was justified. I give it a 5/5 rating out of my own personal opinion and taste of this movie. Spirited Away was an amazing family movie, an all-time favorite of mine, and a great movie that is view-able for any audience.

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