Idol culture is one of those weird specific parts of Japan as a whole that we, in the
west, don’t have a proper comparison for. An Idol is a young girl who gets glitzed and
glamoured up to sing and perform for audiences. To be a star that comes from nowhere in order
to entertain and inspire us all, but perhaps just as quickly, to also fade away into obscurity.
The closest thing we possibly have over here is celebrity culture with Hollywood. But even
then, Hollywood has lost its luster of being that place for anyone – a place where a
person, with no money in their pocket but a dream in their heart, can travel to and
seek their fortune. Idols in Japan are overall still going strong.
Maybe not as strong as they were in the 80s, but you know, times change.
For many young girls, becoming a Pop Idol is a dream, one that some are lucky enough
to see fulfilled. It’s a dream of inspiring hundreds, or thousands, of others through
their performances to briefly escape their dreary lives and live in the moment. To create
a passionate following of fans excited to see them, even if their lives off-stage are
less glamorous than they would have hoped. Perfect Blue is about one such young woman.
However, this is not a story about a dream, but instead a nightmare. One that, now finally,
in 2019 we can experience on Blu-ray in all its HD glory. Ladies, gentlemen, and others,
my name is Arkada and welcome to Glass Reflection we are taking a look at Satoshi Kon’s psychological
masterpiece “Perfect Blue”. Let’s jam.
To start off my attempt to talk about this
film, a bit of context should be given about the show’s director. Satoshi Kon, who unfortunately
passed away in 2010, is a well-respected director and has been credited by some as a kind of
visionary. The work that he produced on his own hit a very different kind of beat from
the norm, and he developed a mastery over a very specific kind of storytelling and animation
mix that resulted in projects far ahead of their time.
This all built up his experience and profile until 1997, when in collaboration with the
animators at Madhouse he released his first feature length film: Perfect Blue.
Perfect Blue is a film based on the novel of the same name by Yoshikazu Takeuchi and
it tells the tale of an established Pop Idol named Mima. Due to wanting to develop her
skills and profile, under the urging of one of her managers, she decides to leave the
singing spotlight that being a Pop Idol gives her and starts to make the transition into
being a professional actress. She does photo-shoots for magazines and soon lands a small role
on a murder mystery series for television. Unfortunately, Idol culture is something that
follows you everywhere you go, something that you can never truly get away from. So when people
associated with Mima end up murdered, it’s clear that a former fan is just a little
too upset that his favourite Idol is no longer in the same spotlight that she once was.
If we left the summary of the film at that, it would probably still make for a very good
story. But narratives by Satoshi Kon are hardly ever that simple and direct.
Mima throughout the film is constantly conflicted with her professional decisions. She believes
that her choices are the right ones, but still doesn’t feel excited by the change. She
seems disappointed at the start and just looks to be going along with it because that’s
what’s expected of her. This is not surprising considering that, historically,
Idols have had very little control over their lives. Their entire outfacing personas are
carefully cultivated by agencies and corporations for various purposes. And with the common
place of finding new Idols out of nowhere, who have no prior experience in music or the
like, Idols are also quite replaceable, which puts further pressure on existing Idols to
succeed or be tossed aside. The changes made to Mima’s professional
life also keeps moving her into situations far darker than she might have originally
bargained for. The television series she got a role for? It eventually writes her character
into having a scene where she gets assaulted at a club. That promotional piece for a magazine?
Well, wouldn’t you know it, but they rather like using nudity in their photo spreads.
All the while she starts to hallucinate, seeing her former Idol self talking to her, berating
her, asking her if this is what she wanted. She keeps losing consciousness during the
day, waking up in her apartment, and wondering how she got there. She sees photos of herself
posted to a fan site that she doesn’t remember being taken. Who was that girl? Was it really
her? Or is the Pop Idol version of herself taking over.
Going back to that murder mystery series she’s involved with, what if I told you that its
own story beats almost mirror that of Mima’s current situation? Leading us, the audience,
to wonder if what’s happening is actually real, or just a recreation of that show’s
story within Mima’s own mind. This is all displayed in a pretty masterful
way through editing and scene changes. Kon has a habit of transitioning between scenes
with matching shots. Like for example showing Mima in a stressful situation near a dead
body, only to fade and have her be performing in front of a studio audience. Which scene
was the real one? Did they both happen? Did neither?
Perfect Blue is almost a textbook example of the Unreliable Narrator trope put to film.
An unreliable narrator is when the story or perspective is told by a character whose credibility
is in some way compromised, and so you cannot trust their perspective or information from
the very character meant to guide you through the narrative. In this case, the story almost
exclusively follows Mima around, but when she starts questioning what is real, we have
to do the very same. We cannot believe anything that is shown to us throughout the film, as
what Mima sees (or doesn’t see) may not have actually happened. Did she buy those
clothes from that department store? She doesn’t remember it, but they appeared in her closet.
Did she really see herself in that passing car? Are there two of her? or is it just a hallucination?
Did she really kill that man as depicted
in one of the film’s own posters? None of this could have happened, and yet
all of it might have. That is kind of the brilliance of the film in many ways, because
it was one of the first to make you truly question what is real and what is an illusion.
Another aspect that Perfect Blue nails is how it depicts a character potentially living
a double life. Kon furthers on this concept with both of his later films Millenium Actress
and Paprika, but in Perfect Blue it starts with this clash between Mima’s private life
and that of her public persona. Most of what we see through her eyes is her
own personal life and what she views, same as what you or I might see. But her public
persona of the Idol has its own personality, its own way of doing things. It is its own character
separate from Mima herself that the audience has to decide if it’s real, a figment of
her imagination under stress, or a metaphysical being manifested through the emotional turmoil
of both Mima and those who idolize her.
As I mentioned, these are the things that Satoshi Kon has played with since. Many of
the same narrative tropes are expanded upon later in his more recent works, albeit in
slightly different ways. Of all of them though, Perfect Blue was really the rawest example
of this storytelling, which is what still makes it remarkable to view even this many
years since the film’s original debut. Now of course there are some dated aspects
to the film. Having to watch someone explain to Mima what the internet is and how to use
a computer with a CRT monitor shows almost the exact age of the film that is a bit funny
to watch admittedly. Despite this, the film can also be extremely relevant to present
day viewers. I’d almost like to say that the film could come off as being even more
relatable to a general audience than it did back in the 90’s, what with the now modern
influence of social media on the lives of the public. It’s interesting just how much
easier it is to have a person be able to reach the same sort of fame and audience today as
the Japanese Idols of the 80’s and 90’s, just for a different medium. Instead of Pop
Stars, we have the stars of Instagram and YouTube, the troubles of cultivating a fan
base on places like Twitch, and even watching those communities spiral out of control when
the personalities behind them decide they want to change. Back in the 90’s, obsessive
fans and their stalker tendencies as displayed in this film were very relevant to the time,
but even today the idea of tracking one of your Idols down and following their every
move has been made all the easier just 20 years later.
There’s even the argument to be made that a person’s online personas are very different
than how those people are in real life, similar to Mima’s private and public personas. There
are so many avenues of discussion and depth to this story, this narrative, that have and
still can be explored, with many more avenues still to come I hope.
This is not a film that will suit everyone’s tastes, similar to how you can’t get everyone
to enjoy something like Monster or Devilman Crybaby. It’s an early example of a film
that you just don’t recommend for someone to watch with the lights off, unless you are
a really horrible friend. You know who you are.
But for the 83 minutes of the film’s running time, this is a story
and an experience that will make you forget your surroundings entirely and become totally
immersed in it. Perfect Blue is an amazing and unique animated
thriller, simply because of the topics that it covers deftly, but simply because it’s
one of the few truly GOOD thrillers to come out of an animated studio. It joined a superb
lineup of anime films from the 90’s that really did show just how different and…well…
adult animation can be. In an age when people today see adult-centered animation as something
that needs to be comedic in order to succeed, Perfect Blue is the reminder we need that
animation can be anything we want it to be. It’s a concept that is both invigorating
and downright frightening.
Thank you for spending the time to watch my
thoughts on Perfect Blue. I hope you enjoyed it! While the film isn’t currently available
for streaming, as is the unfortunate case with far too many anime films, you can however
order the DVD and (more importantly) the Blu-ray online. It is available from the American
distributor GKIDS, that was also nice enough to sponsor this video.
For alternate Anime recommendations, it is very difficult to come up with similar anime
that either have the same tone or even the same kind of impact that Perfect Blue has.
The easy recommendation is to simply watch anything else that Satoshi Kon has been
Legendary director, this time Masaaki Yuasa and his 2004 film Mind Game.
This film is a trip, and if you've ever seen Yuasa's work before like say Devilman Crybaby
You'll know that it tends to occasionally dip into the abstract and just have an animation style
that is wholly unique. I really do need to get around to making a video, about Yuasa's work as a whole.
But until then I leave you with that recommendation as it is one of my favorite films of his.
and it will almost literally blow your mind. My second
recommendation is not for an individual film, but rather for the entire film series.
Kara No Kyokai – The Garden of Sinners. I’m not bold enough to say that Sinners took any
cues from Kon’s work, but there are a lot of elements that are in a similar vein. But
while Perfect Blue and Kon’s work as a whole focus a lot on a more realistic perspective
on things, Sinners is far more fantastical and epic in scale which adds a nice flavor.
Among those options, I hope you find something to your liking.
Lastly, I want to give a very special thank you to my patrons, who not only support my
work in general, but who also allow me to do what I do. I love and appreciate you all.
Specifically though, as I like to do, I want to give particular shout-outs to patrons
Joshua Garcia, Calhoonboy, Siri Yamiko, Ryefan Boneapart, and Rune Jachobson
for being especially awesome. You guys are great! And until next time – ladies, gentlemen,
and others – watch more anime…and stay frosty.