Spirited Away

    (Viz, 2002)
™ and © Viz Communications, Inc.

The winner of this 2003’s Academy Award for best animation, this film is Alice in Wonderland meets Dorothy in Oz, as a 10-year-old girl confronts a complex chain of disorder that arises from the simple act of moving to a new home.

Chihiro’s reality becomes a strange fantasyland where her parents have been transformed into pigs and humans are not wanted. Guided by the cryptic boy Haku, she gets a dirty job in a bathhouse owned by the greedy Yubaba. In this last volume, she must cope with the rampaging spirit of No Face, while trying to unravel the curse on Haku. In a world overflowing with stink gods, sprites, and dangerous spirits, can Chihiro retain her identity and her will to return back home?

This famed creator of Nausicaä and director of My Neighbor Totoro and Kiki’s Delivery Service has continued to surprise his critics, surpass the expectations of his fans, and shape the perceptions of what a motion picture can achieve. Though formatted for right-to-left reading and divided into more volumes than necessary, this adaptation is true to the film’s spirit. And for that readers will be grateful.

— Oliver Chin
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