Become a Creator today!Start creating today - Share your story with the world!
Start for free
00:00:00
00:00:01
Perfect Blue (1999)
400 Plays2 years ago
In this episode of Chatsu-Nani?!, Satsunami is joined by his friend Andrew to discuss the Satoshi Kon classic Perfect Blue.
Patrons:
- Battle Toaster
- Sonia
Use my special link zen.ai/chatsunami and use chatsunami to save 30% off your first three months of Zencastr professional. #madeonzencastr
Check out more episodes here!
Recommended
Transcript
Introduction to Andrew aka Green Shield95
00:00:05
Speaker
Welcome to Chatsunami.
00:00:17
Speaker
Hello everybody and welcome to another episode of Chatsunami. I'm Chatsunami and joining me today is none other than the perfect idol himself. You may know him by stage name as Green Shield95 but today he is joining us as Andrew. Andrew, welcome to Chatsunami. Thank you and yeah I hope to shed my good girl image and make it out there in the big world of
Exploring 'Perfect Blue': A Psychological Thriller
00:00:40
Speaker
podcasting. Yeah I can't wait for that.
00:00:42
Speaker
When's the AG film coming out? Oh, it's already been out. It's sort of been out of years. I just haven't told you about it yet. Well, I have to end the episode to go look for it. Well, that's the shortest episode of Jazz Tsunami. Jokes aside, how are you doing today? Yeah, I'm OK. It's in the spooky season currently. I don't know if the episode will make it into the Halloween Spectacular month, but it's currently October here. Not to time date this too much. And yeah, I'm excited to be watching spooky films, like the psychological thrill that we're talking about today.
00:01:10
Speaker
And what psychological thriller would you be talking about? That's none other than Satoshi Kon's Perfect Blue, an anime movie about a idol who decides to break out of her role and try and break into a different industry.
Satoshi Kon's Influential Filmography
00:01:24
Speaker
It does not go super well for her, so that's kind of where the sort of psychology and the horror aspect of it kind of comes in. But yeah, I'm looking forward to talking about it more.
00:01:33
Speaker
as, well, you will especially be aware of this because you were there. But you and I, and of course Adam, we all recorded during, I think it was last Christmas, wasn't it? Or Christmas time? Yeah, it was around about November or December time of last year. Yeah, we recorded an episode for another Satoshi Koin film, that of course being Tokyo Godfathers. And
00:01:55
Speaker
Satoshi Koen unfortunately he died relatively young and he left behind quite a limited filmography. Yet he left behind some quite iconic films. He's directed films like as we said we've got Perfect Blue, we've got Tokyo Godfather's Paprika, Paranoia Agent was that him as well?
00:02:17
Speaker
it was. That was a TV series though. So he's very distinctive and no more does this show of course than with Perfect Blue and as you said it's about this psychological thriller involving a former idol trying to break out and trying to
00:02:32
Speaker
You know, make it as something other than their alter ego, which of course, without giving too much away, goes horribly wrong
Initial Perceptions of 'Perfect Blue'
00:02:40
Speaker
for her. But before we get into that and we tear apart, as it were, this particular topic, how did you hear about this movie? I've known about Perfect Blue for a long time actually, but I didn't get around to watching it until quite recently.
00:02:52
Speaker
It's kind of always been in my periphery. My older brother was a big fan of this movie in Satoshi Kon's work when I was younger, and he had it on DVD. But because of its reputation of being a bit of a more mature movie with its themes and its artistic directions, I was not in a place where I felt like I could watch it yet. And so it took me a very long time to eventually get around to watching. And it's always been one that I wanted to watch. And so this podcast actually gave me a good excuse to watch it with my partner.
00:03:20
Speaker
But I know I've known of it for such a long time, both because of my brother and because of the wider anime community's regard for this movie. It's incredibly influential. It has inspired so many movies as a result of this.
Could 'Perfect Blue' Work as Live-Action?
00:03:34
Speaker
Some of which, such as Black Swan, the Western movie by the ballerina, have been denied by its creator, but the influences seem pretty convenient if it's not otherwise influenced. So yeah, that's kind of my experience of it. What was your experience with this film and Satoshi Kon's work?
00:03:49
Speaker
Well, the first time I remember actually seeing this film was through a friend who'd recommended it, and this particular friend and I watched probably a range of very strange films, like Twin Peaks, I know that's a TV series but that kind of thing, Event Horizon, those kind of mind twisty films to put it very, very nicely. And
00:04:10
Speaker
I always remember watching Perfect Blue for the first time and just being quite taken aback by it. It wasn't something that I was, to be quite
Mima's Transition and Mental Health Challenges
00:04:19
Speaker
honest, I was used to. I was quite shocked at it. I thought, wow they really got away with certain things in this anime. It was definitely one of those ones that I thought, wow this is
00:04:30
Speaker
really something different, and I know that's a vast understatement. But in terms of Satoshi Koin's other work, I'm going to be honest, I wasn't as knowledgeable about them until of course you introduced me to Tokyo Godfathers, which I think is probably the only the second film from Koin that I've actually watched. The first one of course being Perfect Blue, and then Tokyo Godfathers a couple of years after. But it is a very hard-hitting film isn't it?
00:05:00
Speaker
Yeah, Perfect Blue is certainly very different in tone to the likes of Tokyo Godfather and another one, you didn't mention it earlier actually, but Millennium Actress is another one of Satoshi Kon's works which I have seen. Those are the only three I believe that I have seen of Satoshi Kon's and a bit of Paranoid Agent. Perfect Blue is very different in tone from a lot of his other works.
00:05:21
Speaker
There's a lot of similar aspects, for sure, in the cinematography and the themes, but it is much darker, I would say, in its depiction of a celebrity's life and how hard it can be for someone in the entertainment industry to change into a different role within that industry.
Parasocial Relationships in 'Perfect Blue'
00:05:41
Speaker
There's a relevance
00:05:42
Speaker
to the movie and its themes of Star trying to change industries that sort of holds up today and an aspect of what we would now call a parasocial relationship that a star has, a celebrity has with his or her or their fans. That is so interesting and I have not seen it done at least in this depth in any other
00:06:06
Speaker
medium. Perfect Blue highlights an aspect of society that is not well represented and fleshes it out into a phenomenal story. And the fact that it came out in 1997, going back to something you were saying there, it's absolutely incredible how on point the commentary is for this particular film. Most definitely.
00:06:29
Speaker
You see, and again, I won't go too much into it just now, but there's particular scenes where you see the actress with a computer, and it's one of those old Mac computers with the chunky backs and everything. Long obsolete now, but back then, it was like, oh, cutting-edge technology. It's amazing to think that this kind of fellow model, although it was made in 1997, it still reflects
00:06:54
Speaker
art society today, whether that of course be typical celebrities like singers and actors and actresses, the Hollywood elite as it were, or something more common nowadays with content creators online. So you've got Twitch streamers, YouTubers, TikTokers, Instagramers, influencers, whatever umbrella term you want to use there. It's just so amazing how reflective it is of that relationship between both fan and creator. Before we dive into that,
00:07:24
Speaker
I've got a quick question for you. So I was looking up the trivia for this particular film and it turns out that apparently this film was supposed to be live action but due to several backers pulling out at the last minute during the production they decided to follow the anime route and the animation as a whole. Do you think that this film would have worked?
00:07:49
Speaker
in live action or do you think as it is it succeeds in what it's trying to convey? I do very much think it succeeds in what it's trying to convey and I do think this film would work in live action. I think it would be challenging for whoever was directing this film in live action but it's not.
00:08:09
Speaker
an impossible movie, like there's certain certain things in anime that are much more difficult to adapt to live action, despite attempts like Dragon Ball is always going to be tricky to adapt. Whereas something like this, which despite the it's not supernatural, but it's psycho natural, or most aspects of it, it still would not be incredibly difficult to replicate in a live action format.
00:08:34
Speaker
you would need some phenomenal actors to take on those parts because the emotions and the psychology being shown would have to be displayed in such a unique and interesting way that an actor would have to spend a lot of time doing. It's one of those things where you worry about them diving too deep into the role and getting in trouble in that regard. What do you think? What is your opinion on that? So what you're saying is you don't want a Jared Leto-style actor coming into this film?
00:09:00
Speaker
to metadata. I don't think we nicely need a Jared Leto stalker personifying the role. I mean, plus he doesn't have no offense to Mr. Leto, but I don't think he probably has the height for the character and I'm actually thinking about it.
00:09:17
Speaker
I've just had my platform boots. But anyway, sorry, my fan fiction aside, will we
Sensitive Themes in 'Perfect Blue': A Warning
00:09:21
Speaker
just dive into what makes Perfect Blue such a perfect... I was going to say perfectly blue film. It is blue. It is very blue. It is a blue film. So will we just dive into it? Yeah, I think so.
00:09:34
Speaker
Before we cut to the ad break, I just want to put out a disclaimer. Before we talk about the themes of this film, we are going to be diving into a lot of potentially sensitive topics including things like sexual assault and stalking in particular of course as we're talking about. So if you are sensitive to any of those topics
00:09:55
Speaker
please feel free to pause or stop this episode now but just giving you a heads up just before you go into this we're going to be talking about themes of mental health and again we're going to be referring to things like parasocial relationships
Chatsunami's Content Overview
00:10:08
Speaker
as well as objectification so just a fair warning in case you're going into this episode expecting our usual bubbly self swim just please be warned for that but without any further ado we will be right back after these messages
00:10:30
Speaker
Previously on Chatsunami, we've analysed what makes a good horror game, conducted a retrospective on Pierce Brosnan's runs James Bond and listened to us take deep dives into both the Sonic and Halo franchises.
00:10:42
Speaker
Also, if you're an anime fan, then don't forget to check us out on our sub-series, Chatsunani, where we dive into the world of anime. So far, we've reviewed things like Death Note, Princess Mononoke, and the hit Beyblade series. If that sounds like your cup of tea, then you can check us out on Spotify, iTunes, and all big podcast apps. As always, stay safe, stay awesome, and
Promotion: Crime Divers Podcast
00:11:02
Speaker
most importantly, stay hydrated.
00:11:05
Speaker
Hey everyone, I'm Laura. And I'm Jill. And we are the hosts of Crime Divers Podcast. We are Scottish sisters who tell each other true crime cases that other hasn't heard of. New episodes are released every Tuesday and you can find us on your favourite podcast platform. So what are you waiting for? Grab your wetsuit and join us as we dive into the world of true crime. But remember, watch out for those sharks!
00:11:33
Speaker
This episode is sponsored by Zenkaster. If you're a podcaster that records remotely like me, then you'll know how challenging it can be to create the podcast you've always wanted. That's where Zenkaster comes in. Before I met Zenkaster, I was put a naive podcaster, recording on low-quality, one-track audio waves.
00:12:08
Speaker
I want you to have the same easy experience I do for all my podcasting and content needs. It's time to share your story.
00:12:19
Speaker
So before we go on and talk about the main themes of this particular film, Andrew, what is Perfect Blue about?
Plot Summary of 'Perfect Blue'
00:12:26
Speaker
Perfect Blue is the story of a singer, part of a Japanese pop idol girl group, who quits her band to become an actress. She learns through doing that that it is not
00:12:39
Speaker
an easy change for her and that to be taken seriously and get away from her good girl image in order to further her career, she has to represent herself in more adult ways. And that comes at the cost of her own mental health. And also she receives the ire from her previous fans who loved her from her previous image and does not want that to change.
00:12:59
Speaker
And that is the funny thing though, because as I said, although this came out in 1997, we have seen particular artists and content creators make that shift. One of the most prolific examples I can think of off the top of my head is Miley Cyrus.
00:13:15
Speaker
you know, she was like one of these Disney actresses, she did the whole Hannah Montana thing and then, you know, that small indie gem known as Hannah Montana. And then of course, as soon as she broke out of that Disneyfication, if that's even the term, yeah, she became very overtly sexual and she had that whole wrecking ball phase and everything. So it's not one of these hard to believe scenarios as a
00:13:42
Speaker
No, I mean, and you cited one example
Idol Culture and Image Pressures
00:13:44
Speaker
there. I mean, you can also talk with someone like Britney Spears going even further back the idea of breaking out of a good person image. These entertainers are having to kind of go a step further to try and like overcompensate or maybe not overcompensate, but try and get out of that innocent mindset or persona. So they are as a result, sort of taking on a lot more adult roles and personifications of themselves.
00:14:11
Speaker
especially the fact that Mima is part of this girl band called Charm. They are very… I don't want to say stereotypical, but you know that way. They're very Popeye delay. They are… Yeah, exactly.
00:14:26
Speaker
the quintessential girl group of J-pop. They've got the cutesy costumes, they all dance together, and relative sync, which is actually quite a fun fact about that. At the very beginning, there is a concert for charm, and they purposely edit it so they're out of sync to give it a more realistic look to it, which I actually thought was really neat, fun animation fact of the night there.
00:14:52
Speaker
But going back to Mima, who I'm not saying we don't know enough about the character, pre-Charmnays as it were, but she's lived in this bubble of, oh she's an idol, she has a step path to follow, she has an image to uphold and of course at the very beginning she announces that she is going to be leaving the band, she's going to be breaking out doing her own thing which
00:15:16
Speaker
of course draws the ire of a lot of very angry fans, and of course one particular fan that we will come back to. But it's this idea as well, and it's quite a disturbing reality.
Challenges for Female Artists
00:15:29
Speaker
It's not even just contained to this forum, and again, like I'm speaking
00:15:33
Speaker
mainly from a male perspective, like of course you and I Green Shield, we are both men. We can't speak, you know, from a female perspective, but it does seem that it's quite an issue for a lot of these female content creators or female artists, singers, whatever background they come from, where there's that caveat of, oh, if you want to break out, that's fine, but there's going to be this sense of objectification that's going to follow you around. And we see that later on, where
00:16:03
Speaker
of course not going to Intepth yet, but she goes into roles that are considered more mature and edgy and I'm saying edgy not ironically here but you know like crime dramas and things where she has to expose herself and it's just a very disturbing thing to consider but what are your thoughts on it
00:16:22
Speaker
It is something that the movie deals with very well. It's hard to say what the difference within Western culture is as opposed to Japanese culture, because some of the roles that she is asked to perform in both as an entirely, at one point, an entirely nude model where everything is on display, which personally, that was very shocking. I don't think I've ever seen an anime TV show or movie that has had an entirely nude character in it where like everything was on display. That was very surprising.
00:16:52
Speaker
and also a scene of sexual assault where her character in the movie that she is playing is raped. And that seemed interesting in that I don't know necessarily that that would be the norm.
00:17:07
Speaker
for young actors in Western media, which made me curious as to whether or not that is a common aspect for actors in Japanese media, if they are often required to do these kinds of roles and whether or not these scenes are frequent.
00:17:25
Speaker
in that media. I know you probably can't speak on that, you probably don't know any more than I do in that, but it is an interesting one because I don't think that that would necessarily be the case over here, what she had to go through and what caused her own issue of her self-image and her identity crisis.
Mima's Internal Conflict
00:17:45
Speaker
Yeah, because it does seem as if, and again, we are obviously again worse speaking purely from like a Western perspective, but it does seem that way that maybe not to that extent, but there is that idea that people want to generate controversy, you know, they want to have the
00:18:02
Speaker
complete opposite of what they were before. You know, it's almost as if they're like shedding their skin and they're stepping into like a new body of, oh look at me, I'm this reborn, different actor, actress, singer, whatever. And that's what seems to be going on here. She's shedding this past that she had as Mima from Charm to Mima the actress.
00:18:26
Speaker
it's quite heartbreaking to see that at times because even though, as you said, she goes through that horrific sexual assault scene, she goes through that scene where she's asked to model nude and everything, even though she's got this bubbly, what you would expect
00:18:43
Speaker
and again I'm not reducing this to say, oh it's just like an anime because it's so much more than that at times but it's very much the kind of anime mindset of I'm gonna try my best, I'm gonna, you know, like her idol self, I'm gonna do my best, I'm gonna do this and that and then of course when she gets home she absolutely breaks down because the tipping point is a very human moment where she finds her fish and she tries to feed them but of course
00:19:10
Speaker
because she's been working all this time, fish are dead and she has an absolute breakdown, she smashes everything, she says I never wanted to do this even though her manager Rume tried to fight against it and say no no don't do
00:19:25
Speaker
it, but she's adamant, she wants to do it, she wants to break out and show people, and that's kind of the horrific thing that she feels as if she has to prove herself in that way. You know, like obviously that would be her choice, like if she wanted to do that, that's completely her choice, but you can see she doesn't want to do it. You can see she keeps saying, oh I'll do it for the content is a bit reductive, but you know, oh I'll do it for
00:19:50
Speaker
You know what I mean though? It's like for the money. And even her agent, he seems like the stereotypical character you would think, oh, he's a sleazy guy, like a sleazy agent who wants to, you know, exploit her for money and everything. And then you actually see after the sexual assault scene where he's in the card and everything and he's talking to her and
00:20:11
Speaker
you know he says he'll take it out to a meal because he just feels so bad that this former idle and squeaky clean character has just gone through that. And it is, it's just absolutely horrific. But of course that leads to another very sinister part of this film, that of course being the antagonist. And it's right in saying isn't it that spoilers here but there are two central antagonists
00:20:38
Speaker
Yeah, central being the key word, because I mean, there's an argument you made as to a variety of psychological antagonists within the movie that she herself is her own antagonist. But yes, there are two characters in the movie that could be definitely described as the antagonists of the film. One who has been ever present as a kind of looming threat, and another who is revealed later on in the movie.
Stalker Character Analysis
00:21:05
Speaker
So when we talk about the first one, the obvious one, I think that's a good place to start. From the very outset of the movie where we see Mima performing on stage, we see a very strange looking man who is like some sort of Japanese Quasimodo. Jesus.
00:21:27
Speaker
This Japanese man who has very peculiar features and today would be described as your typical internet stereotype of someone who's very insular and stays inside all the time and doesn't interact with many people.
00:21:44
Speaker
But here he is acting as a bodyguard at her show, and he seems to be entranced by her. And when some hooligans start causing a bit of a rabble, he confronts them and ends up getting beaten up as a result. This is kind of to show his protective
00:22:00
Speaker
nature towards her. And at one point during her performance, he holds up his hand. So it looks like Mima is dancing on his palm, which demonstrates very much a possessive nature to him and his relationship with Mima, that he sees this idol as his and his alone, and that it stays in this form. And this this is the form that he sees Mima in.
00:22:26
Speaker
Yeah, it's very interesting the way a lot of these shots are framed. In particular, as you said, when he's holding her almost from a distance, it looks as if he is holding them more like a doll or something like that as opposed to, you know, recognising her as a human being with thoughts, with feelings, with free will. Throughout the film, of course, you see that he starts harassing her and he starts saying things like,
00:22:52
Speaker
Oh, you're not the real Nima. There's a reason behind it and we will get on to that. But again, it amplifies something that you brought up earlier. That of course being the idea of parasocial relationships which, don't get me wrong, parasocial relationships have always been there.
00:23:10
Speaker
you have people who stalk celebrities, you have people who stalk basically pre-internet. There are stalkers, but you can get away from the fact that that was the case. But the thing that I absolutely adore is the wrong word to say, but I think is absolutely done brilliantly is the fact that they do something that pretty much parallels today's society, doesn't it? Where you've got all these content creators online, myself included of course,
00:23:35
Speaker
where they put their lives out there, they talk about different things and they get people who latch on to others. For example, I don't know if you saw this, I'm going to name drop another. You might have heard of this famous podcast or
00:23:50
Speaker
indie podcast I should say. That of course became Trash Taste and in one of their live shows, I don't know you've probably seen this but there was a video of a guy who ran up onto the stage while they were doing a panel and he just sat beside them. Did you see that video?
00:24:06
Speaker
I did, yeah. And I remember them talking about it after the fact, an idea of fans who become too comfortable with a particular celebrity or influencer and describing the definition of parasocial relationship, but essentially believing the relationship that is very much one sided is reciprocal.
00:24:26
Speaker
Even though the fan knows so much more about the creator's life than the creator does on the fan, that they are friends, that they have an existing relationship and an expectation that it will be reciprocated.
00:24:41
Speaker
I think in the actual case of the Trash Taste situation, the person wasn't even really a fan and was just kind of there and just thought it'd be funny. It's not necessarily a situation of parasocial relationships, but those do exist for sure.
00:24:57
Speaker
And it isn't a current issue, as you said, this has existed. The term is very much modern, but this has existed for a very long time. I do recommend the history podcast that's called You're Dead to Me. And they actually do an episode all about the history of fandom. And they discuss parasocial relationships in 16 and 1700s kind of thing, which is very interesting. Continue listening to this episode before you go check that out, but do check that out.
00:25:21
Speaker
Finish what we're saying. What we're saying is very important, and we love you. Our parasocial relationship is one that is very much reciprocated. We know and love everything about you. Isn't that right, Satsanami? So if you want to get in contact with Andrew, you can...
00:25:36
Speaker
stay awake. No, I know exactly what you mean though. It's definitely, as you said, it's nothing exactly new, but I mean, especially in this day and age, there seems to be like an ongoing, I don't want to say trend, that's completely the wrong word, but an ongoing thing of having these contemporary and updated terms. The idea again of the part of social relationship, as you said, it's this one-way street into somebody's life and it is
00:26:06
Speaker
is freaky because there's real life examples as well. I can't remember off the top of my head the woman's name but there was actually a Japanese idol who, I don't know if you heard about this, they had a stalker who zoomed in on a picture of them and they zoomed into their eye and they managed to recognise where she was based on the reflection of her eye.
00:26:29
Speaker
There's obviously a scale, there's a spectrum of how fanatical certain fans are going to be. That's unfortunately a fact of this particular area. And in the case of this stalker who refers to himself as me-mania, personally for me I think this is obviously part of the sexual assault scene and quite a few other scenes. But one scene that really got to me, and I don't think it got to me when I first watched this film. Maybe I was too young to think about the ramifications of this but
00:26:59
Speaker
There's a particular scene where Mima gets a computer from her manager Ruby and Ruby teaches her how to use it and she's using it like a child. She's very much, you know, this childhood wonder of hitting the keys with two index fingers and everything. She's having so much fun and then she looks up her own name, which if you're a celebrity, never look up your own name on the internet. That's just rule one. But she looks up her own name and she comes across this website that
00:27:27
Speaker
basically, she thinks it's like a fan page and she's like, oh this is funny, they're basically pretending to be me, you know, doing all these concerts. And then the further she reads on her face and kind of just say the animation is absolutely fantastic at conveying this, her face just drops from immediately from one of childish glee to just absolute dread and horror as they start documenting, oh
00:27:52
Speaker
I went to this shop for milk, this particular brand of milk, I went to this place because I love this food, I love that!" And it was getting so, so intimate that she just starts freaking out and she starts obsessing over it. But yeah, as you were saying before, the stalker takes this role of, I suppose a white knight is what we would call it, on someone else's behalf, whether they want it or not, they are
00:28:19
Speaker
seen themselves as a saviour to someone they consider weaker and more vulnerable and by doing that, they portray themselves as the hero. It's a bit like fairy tale logic isn't it, where everybody wants to be like the brave knight or the brave hero who rescues the princess and everything and they want to get that reward at the end. So whether or not that's what this character's thinking or because
00:28:45
Speaker
towards the end it gets a bit more sinister than that. He wants to usurp her position as it were. He wants her gone because he thinks that Mima is the quote unquote fake. But what are your thoughts on that though, just like the whole part about her finding this entry of her online and how the stalker basically documents her journey?
00:29:07
Speaker
More so than her attempting to change industries. Her real biggest mistake was entering the online world. That was just error number one. Rule number one, guys. Yeah, exactly. But no, it is, as you said, it's fantastically well done and represented. She goes through, and I think it's actually later revealed it, the stalker who we are aware of is not the one that's making these comments. It is someone else. But to the point you're making about his sort of white knighting,
00:29:34
Speaker
I'm not sure as much. I mean, there's certainly an argument to be made in that respect. I think it is more of a case of possessiveness. I think he is seeing someone else using her in ways that he is not comfortable with, that he imagined himself with her and is seeing this other side that is not the Mima
00:29:54
Speaker
that he knows and loves and that he owns. That he has, there's at one point after her naked photoshoot, which is being distributed in magazines, where he discovers this and so buys every copy. And it isn't a perverted reason. It's not that, oh my god, she's naked, I have to see them all. It's, she's naked, I don't want anyone else to see this.
00:30:17
Speaker
So he buys up everything and there's a scene where he's purchasing it and he's like sweating and like he looks like you're kind of common kind of like pervert trying to purchase pornography. But you understand with him that that's not the case. He is not doing it for that reason, at least not mainly for that reason. He is attempting to prevent
00:30:36
Speaker
her image from being sullied in both the wider world, but more so in his own mind. And that by removing that from this one newsstand that he's purchasing it from, he feels that he is doing his part to remove the fake Mima from the world. Touching on that scene where he buys all those images
00:30:56
Speaker
I like the fact that all of the background characters look at them as if what the hell is he doing. But it's not done for comedic effect, you know, when you have an anime film or something like that and they'll have the exaggerated expressions and they'll look as if, oh, I see bangs, so when they booby-picks, oh. Nosebleed.
00:31:17
Speaker
don't get me started, that's another episode. Yeah, my rants aside, they look at them very realistically as if that is a very weird thing to do and for obvious reasons. And you're completely right, it's a form of possessiveness that manifests itself in such horrible ways from him turning up at our work
00:31:38
Speaker
and then her psychological state starts to degrade that you don't know what's happening, like whether certain things are actually happening or she's just like completely imagining
Cinematography and Art Style in 'Perfect Blue'
00:31:51
Speaker
it. And it's something that you'd mentioned to me before we came on about the whole idea of the cinematography of this film which
00:31:59
Speaker
is fantastic, but it's absolutely mind-blowing their names, hasn't it? It is so interesting, the cinematography both... I don't know if you... The artistic direction and the cinematography can be two different arguments, I guess, and two different points, but both are so interesting because they managed to accomplish so much detail without adding a lot of detail. There's aspects
00:32:22
Speaker
to the movie that is not super detailed in its drawing, like the facial expressions or the facial features rather are pretty standard. They're not, there's nothing really too detailed about them, but the backgrounds are always gorgeous and like well, very detailed. And the expressions, the frame rates that are utilized are allow it to express so much in this
00:32:46
Speaker
I don't want to keep saying basic because it's not. It's very much not and it's an art style that is dated, I would say. I don't think that this particular style is utilized in modern anime and the cinematography direction representing
00:33:02
Speaker
the characters kind of in their psychosis shows just where they are in their mindset and like is able to convey so much from just a camera angle so much from just it's hard to say camera angle because it's not always found it very hard to describe with with anime like the different kind of angles that are utilized in what would be a sort of camera angle and a live action movie and the difference of metaphors that are represented through very kind of
00:33:31
Speaker
simple scenes.
00:33:47
Speaker
starts to lose it, her mental state starts to degrade so rapidly, you can certainly tell that the film reflects that by being fractured and looping ahead and back in time, and it's all over the place and that is just such an intense moment, so much so that she starts dreaming of herself, stabbing people and aiming for the balls as it were in one particularly horrific scene. That's the reason I don't order Domino's, that's how we'll say Terrified Me, but
00:34:16
Speaker
Yeah, it's that idea of her trying to piece her mind together, trying to be a stable person and it's just everything's getting to her at once. It's absolutely, it's fantastically done. I can't stress that enough, it's just the way you watch her go from this keeps saying stereotypical but that kind of typical Paul Pidal or
00:34:37
Speaker
J-pop idol where she's like very happy, she's innocent, she's naive and then she just falls down this rabbit hole of such sinisterness and just horror really. Psychological horror to be exact but I think the worst thing as well, I mean there's lots of worst things in this film but one of the worst things is another theme of
00:35:00
Speaker
projection, which I'm sure you as well Andrew, you'll know watching other content creators where there's a lot of fans who will try to project their ideal image onto particular content creators.
Fan Desires and Creator Pressure
00:35:13
Speaker
And again it's more prevalent with online creators but you'll see people who are obsessed even with actors or artists or musicians who they say, oh you should be doing in this particular style. And of course when they change their normal work it becomes just this
00:35:29
Speaker
I don't want to say this anger, but resentment from a few hardcore fans. Do you know what I mean? Yeah, I know exactly what you mean. And as you say, it is common in the entertainment industry for this to happen where diverging from the norm is met with ire.
00:35:44
Speaker
that there is this kind of expectation that the status quo should be maintained. For example, for a YouTuber, say, oh, I subscribed for this kind of content. I didn't subscribe for you to be doing this now. This isn't what I'm interested in. So it's gone downhill since then. You should be doing more of this. I know referencing Game Grumps, I remember Aaron, who used to go by Egoraptor, he used to be an animator. And he still, to this day, over a decade later, still gets
00:36:11
Speaker
I wish you were still doing sort of animation. I preferred when you were doing animation, get back to doing that kind of thing. And it's been over a decade and he still, he still gets that. So it's one of those things where you're just, you will never please everyone with your content. So unless you're pretty confident that it will completely ruin your, uh, your career to do it, then don't worry about that and try new things. Try and experiment with the things you're passionate about. You don't need to do what other, and this isn't just limited to the entertainment industry.
00:36:40
Speaker
You should not be doing things that you know that others expect of you. You should do things that are best for yourself. Because when people, obviously, you don't have to hear this from us, or maybe you do, but healthy relationships don't stem from someone basically puppeteering you, if that makes sense. It's
00:37:01
Speaker
not healthy for someone to come into your life and dictate what you can or can't do with said life, because you know, going a bit deep here, but life is very short. Life is one of those very unfortunately finite things that we have to make the most of. So when you want to, in the case of the film, when Mima wants to become an actress, she wants the glamour and that, not glitzy lifestyle, that's a step too far, but she wants to become something other than Mima from Charm.
00:37:30
Speaker
And yeah, although she can see that our colleagues later on in the film, she sees that they are succeeding without her, and there's that kind of sense of, oh god, were they better without me? And of course we get that very famous scene, as you said, which is
00:37:46
Speaker
I think it's featured in Requiem for a Dream as well, but it's also featured in Black Swan where she's under the bathwater and she just screams into it and it's like such a raw emotional thing. But going back to what I was saying, when you have people like that in your life that are very controlling, very possessive to coin a phrase from you,
00:38:06
Speaker
quite a horrible thing and the horrific thing though is for a lot of people you know you've got people who will come face to face with you and it kind of becomes a bit more obvious if that makes sense that that's what they're trying to do but for again going back to parasocial relationships this is very much a one-sided conversation going back to Mima here she's got this stalker who's saying no no no no you should be doing this you should be doing overly sexual content you should be doing this this and that
00:38:36
Speaker
And obviously Mima doesn't want to do this kind of stuff, but the fact that she's got someone who eagerly wants to step into that role as, as you said, as the protector to try and control her life, try and gear it towards what he wants rather than what Mima wants, because Mima sees him like a handful of times throughout the film, over a space of a couple of months, doesn't she?
Rumi's Delusional Projection
00:39:02
Speaker
Yeah, she always identifies. I mean, he's got a pretty recognisable face. Oh yeah, it looks like he's been hit in the face with a shovel. I knew you said my Quasimodo comment was rough. Sorry, just quickly to touch on that. I know he's supposed to look like that because, and I know that was rough, apologies, but
00:39:18
Speaker
he is supposed to like that to be the stereotypical boogeyman, if that makes sense, where he is the stereotypical stalker with the twisted features that don't sit right. I know that
00:39:33
Speaker
kind of links in. Again, I'm not an expert on it, but it kind of links into the issue in Japan of otaku culture, which don't get me wrong, the West as well, especially with the UK and the United States, they have their own forms of otakus, weeb, whatever you want to call them. But in this case, it's like a more sinister version because there are young people there as well that obsess over one particular franchise, over one character, or in this case, one particular young woman.
00:40:03
Speaker
Just going back to what you were saying about his appearance, that is actually one of the issues I take with the movie. And I feel like wasn't represented particularly well. Yes and no, actually. I'm going to kind of contradict myself a little bit. There's certainly a point to be made that stalkers or just these types of people don't all look like this.
00:40:23
Speaker
They come in all shapes and sizes. They can look like your neighbors. Someone who you know, someone that you work with just can look very normal and don't necessarily stand out as being, Oh, this person is definitely a stalker. Look at him. And so when you kind of are in your face as this film is with, Oh, this guy looks horrible and he's a stalker clearly, obviously bad. I don't think that is very good.
00:40:42
Speaker
However, there is the reveal later on that there is someone, that the true antagonist, the true villain is someone that Mima knows, that is what could be described as a normal person in some aspects. So the film does turn that point on its head in a clever and interesting way, but it still does represent this stalker character who is still a stalker despite them not being the main antagonist. They are still an antagonist as this stereotypical, you use the phrase otaku,
00:41:10
Speaker
And it's not wrong in any way to describe him as such. And so that is my criticism for how the character is dealt with. I don't think there's very much else wrong with this. And again, they do deal with it in a very clever way where there's misdirection used as to the true villain, but they still do represent the stalker as a very abnormal looking person.
00:41:29
Speaker
I don't know if it's done because it's supposed to be like the red herring to throw you off who's actually pulling the strings, that of course being Rumi, or if it's just because they wanted a character who would serve the role as the villain.
00:41:46
Speaker
I get what you mean because this is something that was, when we were growing up of course, the internet was a relatively new thing. Obviously we had dial-up internet, we had the very slow internet as it were, but when I was in school in particular, and I'm assuming this would be very similar to you Andrew. No, old man. The future is now, old man.
Reality vs. Fiction in Media
00:42:09
Speaker
But you would have these classes where obviously they would be, and they still do nowadays, I would hope.
00:42:14
Speaker
they taught you about cyber security and making sure that you didn't give out your personal information to strangers. All the usual tickling books kind of things. And that is one of the things they do drum into you, that predators, stalkers, whatever, they do not fit an archetype. They do not fit one catch-all picture or description. There's actually a really good advert that highlights this. I can't believe I'm referencing this but
00:42:41
Speaker
There was an advert ages ago where it showed you like a fairly, I don't know if it was Scottish or English, the advert, I can't remember, but it was basically about internet safety and it showed you this very normal kind of attractive looking guy who's like running around, he's helping people, he's like
00:42:57
Speaker
oh yeah he has such a good power of the community and then it takes like a Black Mirror-esque twist where of course it turns out he's a predator and he starts making sinister comments about how he's sending messages to young and vulnerable people to do certain things and then he gets arrested and is a very short but
00:43:17
Speaker
just a horrible, horrible advert, but again it highlights perfectly how there's not a one catch-all image as it were for this particular individual and I get what you mean though, I totally get what you mean about that stereotypical representation of the stalker as if it's a job application or something.
00:43:37
Speaker
Yeah, speaking of that, will we go into really the finale and the big twist of this film? Yeah, I think so. In the very end, we find out, of course, that Rumi, who is portrayed as this very kind-hearted woman who is, of course, me as manager slash
00:43:57
Speaker
also a former Pop Idol, and she ends up revealing her self as being the one who, as I said before, is pulling all the strings. She is basically… I don't know if it's the right term to say she wants to become her, but she wants to become the idealised version of Mima. She wants to be that Cham version of Mima.
00:44:16
Speaker
to, again going on to this word of projection, she wants to project herself on to her and be what she thinks she should be. And of course there's that like massive disconnect between reality and fiction where, and I think this is one you brought up to me when we were watching this film and you were sending me messages, but
00:44:38
Speaker
there's a particular scene at the end where of course Mima's getting chased by Ruby and she's got a knife she's chasing after and you can see that her idealized version is gliding and skating through the air and everything but then you see this snapshot, it only lasts like a couple of seconds. Through reflection.
00:44:59
Speaker
Yeah, through a reflection in the window where she's running after and she's obviously quite short. Portly. Thank you, that's a perfect word, Portly. And she's just struggling and she's out of breath and everything and it's a complete disconnect between reality and fiction. And one particular example that comes to mind is
00:45:20
Speaker
if there's any UK listeners out there, you'll know exactly what I'm talking about here, but there is a soap opera that has been running for goods like a couple of decades now called Eastenders which is about people living in the East End of London and everything, there's drama, but a lot of people in the UK get very passionate about their soap operas and there's one particular moment
00:45:43
Speaker
in one of the storylines where one of the women... Spoilers for his tenders. I don't have spoilers for this. I think it's a 10 or 15 euro plot line. Oh, good. But yeah, there's a scene where, unfortunately, a woman miscarrys a baby so she decides to steal someone else's, which obviously she's not in the right frame of mind. She's very hysterical. She's upset. It was quite a shocking storyline because it happened at Christmas.
00:46:09
Speaker
Oh my god, they stole the plot of Tokyo Godfathers!
00:46:14
Speaker
sort of black swan, right going for a dream. And now we've got EastEnders, those sons of bitches, they can't keep getting away with this. But yeah, she steals the baby. And you know, this caused real upset with people because they're like, oh, when they enjoy Christmas, I don't want to watch, you know, quite a harrowing and depressing tale. It got so bad people were going up to the actress in the street and even though she was with her own family, like a real family, they were harassing her, they were
00:46:43
Speaker
yelling abuse at her. All kinds of horridness. It is absolutely astonishing, especially in this day and age, it's astonishing how people still can't make that separation between what is real and what is complete fiction, separating the creator from their creation, if that makes sense.
00:47:03
Speaker
especially obviously there's more going on with Ramey, she's mentally unstable, she's not thinking straight and of course that's very apparent when she keeps losing her wig, she stabs herself and nearly gets hit by her truck. But what's your opinion of that Andrew?
00:47:18
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, that's kind of one of the main themes in the movie that we barely actually touched on is the separation of reality from fiction and the character from the reality of the situation. The Mima herself would see this idolized version of herself represented in a mirror that would talk to her and taunt her.
00:47:39
Speaker
and she would chase it down a corridor is very on the nose metaphor of chasing after something that you've you've you've lost an identity that you no longer have and the kind of breakdown of what is what is real and what isn't where we kept kind of shifting between scenes and neither we the audience nor Mima in the film.
00:47:58
Speaker
knew which was real, which wasn't, would seem at times the movie that she was working on mirrored the plot of the story we were following. So we weren't sure if the entirety of what we were following was actually just the plot of this movie that she had kind of internalized. And then that happens to Rumi, where she has brought this fiction of
00:48:18
Speaker
who the idol Mima is and held onto it to such an extent that she became that, that she saw herself as the true reflection of that. And that kind of comes to a crashing halt when towards the end of the chase scene, she has her wig removed, which kind of brings her briefly back into reality from this fiction that she'd created of herself as as Mima and
00:48:42
Speaker
ends up walking out into the busy road or a truck almost, or maybe does hit them. But Mima kind of saves Rumi at the end. And so it is so interesting. And that's kind of one of the big mind fucks of the movie where you just never fully know what is reality and what isn't. As I said, there are points where you don't know if the entirety of what you watched was just internalized plot of another movie through the mind of a disturbed Mima.
00:49:08
Speaker
So it's certainly it's not a movie where if you are struggling in your own mental health, these kinds of films can often trigger responses in that. And so this is not a film that is necessarily for everyone in a current state of mind. There are times in my life where I wouldn't have been as comfortable watching this movie.
00:49:25
Speaker
Whereas now I feel more comfortable to watching this and analyzing it and understanding it. When I was younger, I might have struggled more with it. And so I think this is a very important film to watch for many when they are ready, when they are able to. And some people will never be able to, and that's fine. But I do think it's a very important movie. I don't want to sort of come up to the wrapping up point just yet. We'll kind of come to that later. But yeah, what are your thoughts on that depiction of fiction and reality within the movie?
00:49:51
Speaker
I think it's done absolutely brilliantly to be honest. You make a fantastic point there. It is a film that does delve into a lot of heavy themes and the fact that mental health is tackled in this way, it's quite sensitive and quite a
00:50:10
Speaker
colourful illustration of these particular issues. You have these very blue and very muted colour palettes at times when Mima is going about her daily business and that is contrasted obviously to her bright clothing, very pink and cutesy looking and comparing that
00:50:38
Speaker
to what she wears normally, what a normal person wears compared to… I'm not saying J-pop idols aren't normal, but what I'm saying is you wouldn't really go to the shops in that on a normal basis, I don't think.
Isolation and Identity Struggles
00:50:52
Speaker
Well, not as far
00:50:53
Speaker
I know, I haven't seen many J-pop idols come to this neck of the woods. Jokes aside, yeah, it seems as if there is a clear separation. Artistically there is, you know, you've got the very colourful, anatomy looking girl or woman, sorry I should say, versus the normal living or average life.
00:51:15
Speaker
character, and where the two start to intersect is of course with the Stalker, who clearly is not the right frame of mind. She's got photos and cutouts of her plastered everywhere, and of course that culminates at the end where he physically attacks her and assaults her, and she manages to fight him off.
00:51:45
Speaker
that is a conscious choice because here's the thing about this film, for the stalker, although you could say that I'm not a psychologist by any means so take what I'm saying with a pinch of salt, but for him he definitely seems to be exhibiting signs of loneliness, of isolation, this seems to be the only outlet he has by obsessing over Mima, whereas
00:52:13
Speaker
Ruby doesn't seem to have that problem in terms of psychological conditions. Both of them don't marry with one another. His is probably more stemmed in that isolation and maybe social awkwardness. Again, you can't say for a fact because we don't get enough to profile him, but you don't really see him interact with many people.
00:52:36
Speaker
you know, when he does it's always quite aggressive or compromising situations, you know, it's like when he's buying the nude magazines, when he's fighting the thugs who, you know, they're just causing issues at the concert, when he confronts Mima altogether or he's sending hateful messages, you know, they seem more related to that whereas
00:52:58
Speaker
Roomie seems to be more interested in preserving what Mima was. This is an unfortunate thing as well with people, and again this is me generalising, but it seems as if she doesn't want to let go of the past for Mima. Mima wants to expand, spread her wings, she wants to try new things,
00:53:18
Speaker
obviously there's a lot of seediness in the underbelly of that but Ruby doesn't want that. She wants to keep her wings clipped and she obviously doesn't have the social skills to like straight up say, no, don't do that, I don't want you going out and doing these like horrific scenes. Whereas as Mima, Ruby is identifying as this character who is confident
00:53:43
Speaker
she's very elegant, she's very… I don't want to say fairy-like, but you know what I mean? She's very elegant, she's graceful, she glides, she doesn't walk. It's almost ethereal if that makes sense. It's very supernatural that she's not just a person, she's almost like a goddess almost, that nothing can harm her.
00:54:05
Speaker
Yeah, exactly. That's the perfect description. She is that character people want to aspire to be, and yet her whole mindset has just completely broken at that point. And it's hard to pinpoint when this happens, because I think it's when she leaves Chan that this starts to happen, and it could have been happening well before the events of the film.
00:54:27
Speaker
I think it is because the implication is that Rumi was the one writing on the message boards or the owner of the website that documented Mima's life. I think it was called Mima's Diary and was documenting everything she does, her entire kind of daily schedule. And you kind of realize by the end that the only one who could have
00:54:46
Speaker
known all of this more so than the stalker was roomie because there were conversations that roomie heard that was documented in in the diary so prior to the events of the movie roomie was already in this state of mind and she acts
00:55:02
Speaker
out as this Mima character to almost, well it's not almost, it's to get revenge on those who would sully what she now sees as the ideal version of herself as Rumi as Mima. And she goes and kills a photographer who took the naked pictures, kills the writer who wrote the scene where Mima was raped and the agent who has been finding her these parts.
00:55:27
Speaker
Just going back to the stalker, actually, I don't know if you noticed this, but the the end scene where she is grabbed by the stalker and almost sexually assaulted, or she was sexually assaulted, almost raped was seems to be the same stage where during the movie scene of her character being raped, that occurs. So there's kind of a mirroring of those two scenes. Did you pick up on that when you when you watched it?
00:55:52
Speaker
that's actually a good point. I don't think I picked up on that, but it's one of those things that I think subconsciously, obviously because of the content, you are disturbed and everything, but it does feel like one of those subconscious things where even the shots, it could be totally wrong in this, but I'm pretty sure it's framed in the same way, like that shot above the stage. I think you're right.
00:56:15
Speaker
Yeah, where obviously that's how they do it for when the first scene is shot in the film and then of course when we come back to that with the reality of it and the actual soccer when she nearly does get attacked.
00:56:30
Speaker
is like a parallel almost. This is again going on to that theme of reality versus fiction and that other scene where it's a horrible scene, don't get me wrong, I really am uncomfortable with scenes like that but in particular this one because she is like such an innocent character but she still wants to do her best and god bless the actors like acting with her because you see some of them like even apologize
00:56:56
Speaker
and it doesn't seem like they're taking any pleasure from it. It's just like, you know, the acting job that they've been given and everything. So you can see that although it's horrible, it's exploitative, at least she's in a safer environment. Whereas, as she said, when you go to the final scene, or rather the final scene with the stalker, you can see that she is isolated. She's alone, trapped on this stage with this killer who, or stalker killer, whatever he's going to do to her.
00:57:23
Speaker
And it is, it's a horrible haunting scene, and it's that sense of vulnerability again of him trying to completely... I suppose erase her, because throughout the film, as we've established, he does take himself on as the de facto protector over, even though obviously he's not. It's a one-way thing, but then it kind of twists into him trying to get rid of her.
00:57:47
Speaker
Yeah, he's visited by this vision of idol Mima telling him that the current Mima is a fake and that only by killing her will it remove that fake Mima and bring back the real Mima.
00:58:03
Speaker
And so this other level of delusion is potentially schizophrenia from the stalker. And schizophrenia seems to be prevalent in a few of the characters in both the stalker, Mima and Rumi, all three of which could, I'm not one to diagnose it, but could potentially be diagnosed with different levels of schizophrenia.
00:58:22
Speaker
No it's a completely valid point, I mean even when I was doing the research for this film, there's so many mental issues that are actually discussed in this film, as you said there's the schizophrenia side of it, and as well one that we actually didn't mention, of course we mentioned the personality disorders and the projection of oneself onto an idealised form. One thing that I don't think we have discussed is depression, and of course that occurs
00:58:52
Speaker
pretty much, I think it's halfway through the film that's hard to pinpoint, where Mima of course she takes the acting role and she just spirals into this complete abyss of not knowing who she is anymore. That is quite a haunting thing because in life we all try to establish ourselves
00:59:13
Speaker
as individuals, whether we want to be content creators, whether we want to be regular people who don't document the list, we want to be who we are, we want to be that particular person. But at the same time, when she's getting pulled from all these sides, she's getting pulled back from her past as a member of charm, she's getting pulled forward as a pseudo-erotic model. She's getting pulled as well by the fact she's an actress now, but then getting pulled back again
00:59:43
Speaker
at the fact that she has to do, as she said, that horrible sexual assault scene. So no wonder she slips into this absolute state of depression. As we said, you know, there's a famous scene where she screams into the bathtub, she smashes everything. The fish that she kind of saw as being a constant, a consistent in her life and something that was there for her prior to her change in industry has been disrupted and that kind of
01:00:10
Speaker
that sets her off as well. So there are definitely several scenes, and I think there's a scene when she's getting the naked photos taken where it comes to her in the bathroom reeling with the decision that she's made in her career. The thing that I think is really real in this is the fact
01:00:26
Speaker
And again, no offense to anyone who has a pet fish and loves him dearly, but in the grander scheme of things it does seem something relatively minor. As you said, it's this consistent that has been with her entire life and then all of a sudden because she forgot to feed fish.
01:00:42
Speaker
yeah she just absolutely loses it and it is such like a human moment because that is like one of the things with depression all it takes is one particular moment to set off someone that's not just the case of oh I'm sad people aren't going to react differently to various symptoms of depression they're not going to isolate themselves on the one hand or they're not going to hurt themselves in the other there's obviously that variation but with
01:01:10
Speaker
Mima, of course, she just absolutely lashes out, she loses it, she has that breaking point over something. Again, I don't want to out the poor fish and be like, oh well, they don't matter. But it's just such a shame that this is the moment that pushes her over the edge, something you kind of think
01:01:29
Speaker
oh it's a minimal moment and it's just utterly been blown out of proportion, then of course she really struggles from that point on to lift herself back up. So it is a really interesting moment. So it's clear that this film definitely dives into a plethora of various mental health issues, mental health states,
01:01:52
Speaker
It's interesting, you can't take your eyes away from the depictions in this film, but before we wrap up, we should probably talk about the unfortunate quote unquote ends of these characters, of course the end of Rumi and Tark in the reign of terror over Mima and of course the death of the Stalker, so do you want to take it away in this one?
01:02:15
Speaker
Sure. So the stalker, it's not fully clear the demise of the stalker because Mima successfully manages to grab a hammer during his sexual assault of her and whack him on
Conclusion and Character Fate Analysis
01:02:26
Speaker
the head. And so he kind of flails to the side and then she leaves the area and finds Rumi and then they when they were when they return, he's gone. But we later see that he is lying dead with
01:02:38
Speaker
the her other agent who has been finding her these kind of seedy roles both dead together. And so the implication could either be the he did survive that got up and was then killed by Rumi or that Rumi just took away his dead body after Mima killed him and just put them together. So that I don't feel was fully clear. Don't know what your interpretation of that was.
01:03:01
Speaker
Yeah, and then later on, at the very end of the movie, following Rumi defeat, and where she then walks in front of traffic is stopped by Mima from being hit by a truck, we then cut to a psych ward psychiatric facility where
01:03:16
Speaker
Rumi is a patient. And we learn that more often than not, she is in this state of fiction of continuing to believe that she is either Mima or a depiction of an idol character that is not her true life and that she very rarely now has these lucid moments of being Rumi. And so we leave this state where
01:03:40
Speaker
Rumi is receiving psychiatric assistance, is getting the care she needs and Mima leaves the facility seemingly as a celebrity and having made this career for herself because she is immediately recognized by some of the nursing staff there and saying, is that
01:03:57
Speaker
Mima? No, no, no way. Is it, is it Mima? She wouldn't be in a place like this. She's too much of a, too big a star. So through that, we can kind of infer that she has made it as the star that she, she wanted to, and it has been a success for her, but we don't know what her mental state is currently at if, if she is better or where the events of the film have taken her psychologically. Because is that not the last line of the film where she says, I'm the real Mima, and then it kind of cuts to the credits?
01:04:27
Speaker
Yeah, she seems to break the fourth wall and address the audience at that point, which is a very interesting decision on the part of Satoshi Kon. Don't know what your thoughts were on that. Do you feel that met the tone of the movie or do you feel that was a little bit of a juxtaposition?
01:04:43
Speaker
Yeah, no, I would agree with you on that. It seems like quite a clean ending. Throughout the film, we have these very fragmented and disjointed moments. We have the other characters, as you pointed out, meeting utterly brutal and grisly ends. And you have, of course, the stalker who comes in, he meets his end and everything. And it's quite a dark and brooding film,
01:05:09
Speaker
even in the beginning where it's like the pop band and they're all happy and oh look we're singing our favourite song and even then there's some sinister elements like as we established there where the stalker holding his hand up
01:05:24
Speaker
for Mima and everything but then we get to the ending and Mima has this action hero line at the end if that makes sense that kind of I'm the real Mima cigar and mouth drive so it sure doesn't do that by the way too much Terminator month for you exactly
01:05:40
Speaker
she done tried to remake us, I'll be back. Nah, she doesn't back. I agree with you, it doesn't seem to fit the overall tone. This is the only other representation I can think of is the fact that objectively Mima is locking away her champ persona for good in the form of
01:05:59
Speaker
Rumi. Not in a literal sense, but in the sense that Rumi so desperately wants to be Mima, she wants to be this pop idol again, she wants to be up there singing as this elegant pop star, whereas Mima just wants to separate herself from that, she wants to be her own person. That's what we've established, she wants to be this actress and everything. So physically, she's technically separating her past
01:06:25
Speaker
that of course being represented by Roubaix and her desire to be that singer, that idol, and she is driving away to say I'm the real Mima, thereby shedding that past self. I don't know if I'm looking too deep into that, what are your thoughts there?
01:06:43
Speaker
No, I think you're correct. You've summed up in better ways than I could have. I think that very much is the case. Yeah. There's not too much more I can say to that. I think that's very well said. What were your final thoughts then of this movie? And would you recommend it to other people? And you're allowed to caveat that with exceptions or the kinds of people who might enjoy this and might not.
01:07:04
Speaker
I would say this is an absolutely fantastic film, from the arch style to the way the story unfolds to the cinematography if that makes sense for an anime film, but the fact that it explores mental health issues and just such deep, deep themes within it is absolutely incredible.
01:07:25
Speaker
and it's one of those films that stands as a testament to what anime can be. You know it doesn't have to be when you think of anime, it doesn't have to be about giant robots or people yelling loudly with crazy haircuts or looking for the one piece after a thousand episodes. I'm sorry Andrew had to put in a one piece dig there.
01:07:44
Speaker
I'm sorry. I will be the king of the pop idols. Oh god, it would have been a completely different film if he was in it. But at the end of the day, this film is not going to be for everyone. Whether you are sensitive to these kind of topics or going a step further if you yourself are experiencing these kind of things. In the case of depression or schizophrenia, borderline personality disorder,
01:08:09
Speaker
a heavy heavy film. So if you are sensitive to these kind of themes, well I wouldn't strongly advise against it but I would say no what you're getting yourself into. I wouldn't say oh yeah go on, you'll be fine. This isn't like Tokyo Godfathers where, don't get me wrong, there's some really interesting themes going on there but
01:08:31
Speaker
it's a lot more light hearted, it's a lot more comical, it's not like Perfect Blue. Perfect Blue is its own entity. I would recommend this film, I would recommend this to people but as you said under the caveat of you know what you're getting yourself into. I don't want people to go out and think oh this is going to be a really interesting character study which it is but it always reminds me
01:08:54
Speaker
when I was in university and we had like a psychology class where they basically said, oh, do you know what you should do? You should go out and you should watch Black Swan. Even to this day, like I'm a bad student, I don't watch it.
01:09:11
Speaker
I had seen that in the wrong mental state or if I'd watched Perfect Blue in the wrong mental state. Obviously that's going to affect me personally and that is not something I'm okay with having on my conscience and having on you guys listening at home as well. So go into it if you are mentally prepared for it. I feel as if as well this film needs a sense of mental maturity. I feel as if if you watch this film when you're a little bit younger, like
01:09:39
Speaker
why you would be watching it, I don't know, but even if you're like a teenager or, you know, you weren't in the right mind space for it, then you're not going to get the full impact. You're not going to get the full themes, the full setting, what the director intends with X, Y and Z, but otherwise, yeah, I would say this is a fantastic film that if you're into that character study and such, definitely check it out because it is a fascinating film.
01:10:05
Speaker
Yeah, no, I agree. And I think The Point You Make There is interesting as well. There will be some teenagers who will watch this and will understand the movie and understand its themes. I don't think I would have as a teenager or even probably into my early adult years, might not have understood it as well as I do now.
01:10:20
Speaker
I think this is a very important movie. This film, not just in the world of anime, I think this is one of the most important anime films. It is up there with Akira and some of the sort of important ones of Studio Ghibli, The Princess Monoke, Spirit of Waze, Howl's Moving Castle, these kind of films.
01:10:39
Speaker
I think this is incredibly important for Japanese film and just film in general. I think this is something that should be experienced. As Satsanami pointed out, there are always caveats to that. If you are not in the mental state that is appropriate to watch this, then you do not need to. If you feel you are able to, then go ahead and watch it. It is very important for many. And there will be cases where it will come at a different time for you. I did try and watch it when I was younger and it wasn't for me.
01:11:08
Speaker
I came back to it many years later and was in awe by it. So I cannot recommend enough that everyone at some point in their lives do watch this film, do embrace it. And I hold such high esteem and such great praise for Satoshi Kon and his work. I think Movie for Movie, he is one of the greatest film directors ever. And his work should be held at the highest regard.
01:11:33
Speaker
I have so far only watched three of his films and one of his TV show. I am looking forward to watching some more of it and I encourage others to follow up and watch his filmography. But yeah, that's kind of, that's my two cents in the situation. First of all, you summed it up perfectly there, but one quick thing I would want to add, just going back to what you were saying about you know
01:11:56
Speaker
maybe being ready for this film like when you were younger. And I completely agree. I would have been exactly in the same boat. I don't think I would have been as mature to understand everything. And it's something that, and this is going to make me feel so old, but it's something that, you know, when you're going through life and every year goes by not to be depressing to end the episode in a bummer. Oh, because the episode itself was a real lighthearted rump. Oh, it was. It was like, you know what, I'm not even going to make a joke.
01:12:28
Speaker
But as the years go on, you start to see different things, you start to experience different things. And of course, during the 2020 great panini, as it's called, everybody was trapped in their homes and everything. And
01:12:44
Speaker
of course personally I took up podcasting and Twitch streaming but obviously my experience as a male content creator is definitely not going to be anywhere near the struggles of female content creators or anything like that but
01:13:01
Speaker
It also gives me a different perspective on how I view this film as someone who puts out content. And don't get me wrong, I'm not someone who is an online light, I'm not anybody famous, you know, you're gonna listen to this and probably just move on to the next podcast and that's perfectly okay. But even still, from that smaller micro perspective, I will say that it does give me a kind of appreciation to see how someone who would be in the spotlight is
01:13:30
Speaker
affected so horribly. So it's a fascinating film in that regard. And also something that of course Andrew, you and I were discussing before we came on was the fact that it is very hard to find this film. It's not on, it's funny to remember, it's not like an Amazon or Netflix, is it?
01:13:48
Speaker
As far as I'm aware, it's not on any of the streaming services, which is so surprising given even the Western world, this is one of the major anime films, I wouldn't say it's necessarily mainstream, but it is relatively well known. So it does surprise me that I had such a tough time finding a copy of this.
01:14:08
Speaker
And as is the case with a lot of anime media, it isn't always the easiest to get like on like DVD, or if you do find a copy, it's often very expensive. I think when I looked to buy it, it was like, it was like $45, which is crazy. So it is, it is not the easiest film to track down, but if you are able to, you should. I would wholeheartedly agree with that.
01:14:28
Speaker
again reiterating as long as you're ready for this film then absolutely please feel free to go and find a copy of this DVD and yeah judge it for yourself really. Going off on the point you said about this film being quite hard to find, one of the things I actually did see in my research was that apparently the original 35 millimeter camera negatives were accidentally destroyed. Now I don't know how that happens,
01:14:58
Speaker
Yeah, I think it's actually more common than you'd think because I've heard of several other films that had similar issues. I don't know who's responsible for films. I mean, so it's not just that I'll be in Japan and I hear about in the Western world of being a big issue as well. But yeah, so many films get lost because of that issue. When I was looking at that, they say that because of that, all of the subsequent releases are also from lower quality videos. So
01:15:22
Speaker
Maybe that's the reason it's so scarce to get, but again, as she said, it's anime logic, isn't it? Well, I say anime logic, what I mean is anime supplier logic, where it is near and impossible to actually buy certain films and things, and that is just such a shame.
01:15:41
Speaker
because as I said, obviously with the caveat of if you're ready to watch it, watch it. But it is quite a shame that people aren't able to watch this film or experience it in their own way. So yeah, it's a shame. But at the end of the day, it's an absolutely fantastic film.
01:15:59
Speaker
If you did enjoy our discussion on Perfect Blue, you should listen to our episode from last year, which co-host of the podcast Adam was on, where we discussed Satoshi Kon's Tokyo Godfathers. It makes a perfect Christmas or festive season companion podcast. So if you're listening to this closer to the Christmas time, then you should, or just anytime of year really, you should check out our Tokyo Godfathers episode. If I do say so, it's very good.
01:16:24
Speaker
And I just wanted to get to the, yeah, first of all, it's great, but it's also a lot more white-hearted than this one. Yes. You're probably not going to get bummed out the same with that one. Much like this and most of the podcasts that we do, there are always spoiler warnings, so we recommend that you check out the property first before listening.
01:16:44
Speaker
On that note, thank you, Andrew, for joining me to tackle this perfectly blue film. Thank you. Hopefully I've developed some very keen fans as a result of my appearance on this this podcast. Yeah, the Red Panda lawyer will be in touch, don't you, buddy? But if you would like to find out ways to contact the Red Panda lawyer, now I'm looking. As Andrew was saying there, if you would like to check out more of our previous episodes, including the Tokyo Godfathers episode, you can check us out on our website, podpage.com forward slash chat tsunami.
01:17:13
Speaker
Or if you want to listen to us on your Handy Dandy podcast apps, you can check us out on Spotify, iTunes and really any good podcast app. Just look for the name Chat Tsunami and we will see you there. But until then, thank you all so so much for listening to this episode. As always, stay safe, stay awesome and most importantly, stay hydrated.