Satoshi Kon's work where fiction and reality intermingle [Mizumaru Kawahara's CINEMONOLOGUE Vol.61]

Index

• “Perfect Blue”, the boundary between delusion and reality
• “Millennium Actress” runs through movies and reality
• ``Paprika'' where dreams invade reality

“Perfect Blue”, the boundary between delusion and reality

August 24th was the anniversary of director Satoshi Kon's death. I encountered the world of his work after he passed away, and I remember having a strange and strong impression on him that I don't often see in other animations. The characters have vivid facial expressions that don't look too anime-like, and the carefully drawn realistic scenes become distorted. At the beginning, the fiction of anime is used as a frame, and the reality depicted within that framework turns even more into fiction. I was drawn in by such layered, nested expressions.

This is especially noticeable in `` Perfect Blue ''. The main character, Mima, who retired from being an idol and started working as an actress, gradually becomes exhausted in the entertainment industry, is frightened by the shadow of an enthusiastic stalker and visions of herself from her idol days, and eventually murders occur around her. A thriller. All of the strangely vivid characters mentioned above are suspicious, and with the disturbing atmosphere typical of the end of the century, I find it unsettling to watch from beginning to end. I watched in suspense to see who would say what next and what Mima would experience.

Although she turned from an idol to an actress, the reaction from fans was somewhat cold, and even though she was given a small role, she was made to act out a sudden rape scene at the whim of the scriptwriter, and she also took nude photos to promote the movie she was starring in. On the path that she decided to take, including being photographed, Mima is consumed by men, but along with that, her idol-era self appears from time to time, and this is something she would do to the point of quitting being an idol. They begin to question whether this is the case. Before she knows it, Mima is pushed into a corner mentally, and the roles she plays at work and even the culprit in the murder case begin to intertwine with her personality, and the story unfolds in a way that confuses the viewer.

Among them, my favorite is the scene in Mima's room. It's a small apartment room, about 1K by the looks of it, but it's filled with magazines, trivial trinkets, the first generation PlayStation, dried flower decorations that give you a sense of the times, a TV video (you can watch anything with this!), an aquarium filled with tropical fish, etc. The scene of a single person's life lined up is depicted in a realistic manner, and I like how the young woman's room, which has a sense of the times, is condensed into the screen. I particularly like the scene where he uses a newly purchased Macintosh Performa (the same one he used at his parents' home) to view Mima's homepage that someone has set up, and the screen is depicted in great detail. Of course, there's something comforting about the atmosphere before computers and the Internet became central to our lives.

The title of the mysterious site is ``Mima's Room,'' and the site is nested inside the actual room. Through this site, Mima worries about the presence of a stalker, and when she returns to her room and is alone, she explodes with dissatisfaction, and is questioned by the illusion of herself from her idol days. It becomes. It is in this room that the story finally confronts the ``true identity'' of the illusion at the climax. This room is the boundary between Mima's fantasy and reality. Because it is so realistically drawn, it stands out how the room is distorted by delusion.