☆ ☆ ☆ ½
Perfect
Blue (1997) – S. Kon
Anime noir that tackles some heavy
issues: stardom, voyeurism, and the
relationship between the two (star and fan).
Mima Kirigoe is a pop idol and a member of the girl group, Cham, who
have a legion of (entirely male) followers.
When she decides to leave the group to become an actress, one of her stalker-ish fans is not happy and
creates a website (using Netscape Navigator) pretending to offer her daily
diary (“Mima’s Room”). This starts to
create a breach between the real Mima and the fictional online Mima, at least in
Mima’s head. The TV drama (about a
serial killer) that she has a recurring bit part in doesn’t help. In order to drastically change her image, her
agent okays a rape scene in a strip club (which is disturbingly recreated here,
alternating between onscreen action and between takes reality – but Mima
becomes lost in the mix). As her career
moves further from the innocent pop idol phase (next up, nude photos), Mima
experiences more jarring breaks with reality.
She begins to be haunted by a spectral image of her former self – and also
by her stalking fan. Meanwhile, someone
is killing the writer, director, and other members of the TV show cast. Or are they?
It is definitely difficult to discern what is real, what is the TV
program, and what is only in Mima’s disoriented consciousness, thanks to the
script and Satoshi Kon’s direction. So, yes,
there is more than a little Hitchcock or De Palma here but the freedom of anime
allows things to get much weirder than a real staging might allow. And darker.
Sure, everything appears to be tied up with a bow by the end but the
themes linger, echoing throughout our culture, perhaps even more prominently
today. What will be done for fame? And
what are its consequences in our online/physical society?
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