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PAPRIKA
Directed by: Satoshi Kon.
Written by: Seishi Minakami & Kon, based on the novel by Yasutaka Tsutsui.
Director of Photography: Michiya Kato.
Edited by: Takeshi Seyama.
Music by: Susumu Hirasawa.
Released by: Sony Pictures Classics.
Language: Japanese with English subtitles.
Country of Origin: Japan. 90 min. Rated R.

In the futuristic setting of this anime, scientists have created a machine, the DC-Mini, which connects into a person’s dream consciousness to discover the root of certain neuroses. But one of the four prototypes has been stolen from the laboratory and used as a form of subconscious terrorism, wiping out the dreamer’s personality. Other lab researchers have gone crazy – whoever has the device has infiltrated their dreams. At first, the culprit seems to be research assistant Himuro, who has gone missing. To solve the mystery, research psychotherapist Dr. Atsuko Chiba enters the dream world of a colleague through one remaining DC-Mini. In this alternate universe, she becomes the sexy 18-year-old dream detective Paprika, who can make connections between one’s subconscious and past history.

In referring to this wonderfully deranged feat of daring visual-do, the word “surreal” is too easy a label, albeit the first that springs to mind. Director Satoshi Kon has made a mature thriller, rated R for fairly good reason. (For all of the images of a doctor dreaming of a sprawling carnival/parade with doll faces, jumping animals, and wacky music, Kon also lays on images of the psycho-sexual involving Paprika, including torture.) The pulpy story is like something by Philip K. Dick, with its futuristic society, the Freudian angles of the characters, and the paranoia surrounding the use of technology.

In adapting Yasutaka Tsutsui’s much-praised Japanese novel, Kon’s imagination and execution is stellar, moving between seemingly placid everyday scenes to the dreams that flow via the DC-Mini. As far as the actual artistry and animation – the variety in colors, layouts, and pace, as well as the truly absurd, random and out-of-control hilarity and terror – think David Lynch at his best collaborating with an acid-head Japanese movie geek/ manga artist. If lacking logic, the climax is a total blast to the eyes as images aren’t flying by like in some of the more frantic action-driven anime, but with enough time for a viewer to take in all of the delirious imagery.

However, the storytelling, even in the realm of tech-driven science fiction, isn’t clear at times – one is never too sure who or why one is in one dream or another or if a character is drifting into one vision or just skipping ahead to a completely different reality. It’s also something of an odd choice to have music that sounds as if it’s been lifted off some preteen’s club mix (lots of crazy beats for the opening theme, repeated several times). But these comments aside, Paprika, for its intended audience of fans of unconventional Japanese animation, is unbound by visual limitations. Jack Gattanella
May 25, 2007