Spirited Away: I Prefer the Second Story, How About You?

In Hayao Miyazaki's Spirited Away, I saw two completely different stories. The first story is about how to preserve inner purity in a world dominated by materialism.

It reminds me of a quote from French symbolist playwright Maurice Maeterlinck: "The faith of life can only be obtained by transcending all kinds of hardships and meeting the gaze of children." This quote made me understand why Spirited Away is about a child's adventure but gave me, an adult, the faith of life. This faith comes from the child's clear gaze, from a fearless and honest innocence that has not yet experienced the world.

In Spirited Away, Miyazaki depicts a mysterious town for us. This town has a medieval style, which is the darkest period in human history. There are no people in the town, only a decadent street view at dusk. The protagonist, Chihiro Ogino, is a just-turned-10-year-old girl. She accidentally stumbled into this town on the way to move to the countryside with her parents. She is a very ordinary child, not particularly beautiful or smart. She is a bit spoiled, cries easily, and is fragile, just like each of us in our childhood.

At first, I thought the next part of the story would be Chihiro's growth, which is the main theme of the story, of course. But on the other hand, I was surprised to find that this story is not only for children, teaching them to be brave. It also comforts every adult, telling us that everyone has something in their hearts that we should try to find and protect. That thing is the instinct to do good.

This town is like a dream, but it is a reflection of reality. It seems imaginative and boundless, but it actually has unshakable operating rules. For example, here, you must eat the food, or you will disappear, but you cannot indulge in eating and drinking, or you will turn into a pig. Here, you must find a job to prove your worth, and those who seek comfort will become animals and be permanently exiled. Here, you must endure that humans are the aliens, and those monsters may come up to you anytime and say, "His smell is really bad!" Here, money is still the supreme existence that everyone rushes to, and for money, even the gods can fight death and lose their dignity. This is no different from the real world.

And what Chihiro will face is such a highly abstract reality. However, she did not come out to challenge these decaying rules or become a hero who changed the world. Instead, she accepted. She found a job in Yubaba's bathhouse and settled down to survive.

This makes the whole story more realistic: each of us can only accept established social rules and become part of this game. The difference is that some people are tamed to be cowardly by those rules, while others always live with a bottom line. The "fearless innocence" of Chihiro is not taught but innate. When the dirty River God came to the bathhouse, everyone retreated; only Chihiro rushed up without hesitation, trying to wash off the layers of dirt for it. That was not due to professional spirit but only a drive of nature. And it was this action that made people look at her in a different way: this little girl is really something.

Chihiro certainly did not realize that her spontaneity was worth admiring in the eyes of others. She was just doing what she thought was right based on a child's intuition.

This small town is run by a pair of twin grannies. Yubaba and Zeniba. They are like the two sides of a coin and also represent the two rules at the bottom of this world. One is called an equivalent exchange, the other is called causal retribution. These rules were not created by them but exist naturally, and they are only executors of the rules. At Yubaba's place, Chihiro got a job and survived in the small town, but in exchange, she gradually forgot her name and lost herself. While at Zeniba's place, Chihiro's friend, Haku, will lose his life by stealing Zeniba's seal, and Chihiro must remedy Haku's crime and save him.

Throughout the story, Chihiro never surpasses the rules of the small town but instead lives bravely and honestly under the rules. It was precisely this honesty that kept her from losing herself and ultimately saved her friends. No wonder the ghost-like No-Face was inexplicably attracted to her from the first time they met and silently followed her. This was not just because of loneliness but also because of a natural instinct for kindness.

No-Face - without gender, face, or emotion - symbolizes a universal humanity. The near-instantaneous decision to follow Chihiro to death gave us a little confidence in the return of humanity. Although No-Face was sometimes confused and sold his most precious gold to win the favor of others, he still wanted to leave the most gold to Chihiro to redeem his inner guilt. No-Face's story is like everyone's story: struggling between goodness and greed, waiting for redemption. In the end, No-Face swallowed Chihiro's pill, vomited out his belly full of desire, and returned to his original appearance. He followed Chihiro across the clean river and found a peaceful home.

In fact, from the beginning of the film, Miyazaki revealed to us the key to crossing the small town. When the tempting aroma of food wafted through the air, Chihiro's parents rushed up to gorge themselves until they turned into pigs and fell under the spell. At that time, Chihiro was not moved, even showing a disdainful expression.

It was precisely this natural rejection from the child that gave her the key to the small town. She was able to wander around, be liked and admired, and finally leave with dignity. She was not a superhero or a hero but just a child who retained her true self. And each of us was once a child. The instinct for kindness does not need to be sought externally; we just look back and confront our former selves to obtain it.

Above is the first story.

Deep down inside me, there's another story that's simpler and cleaner. In this second story, there's no evil, no darkness, only a young girl facing the farewell of her childhood. This farewell started with a move to a new home.

At the beginning of the movie, Chihiro encountered the mysterious town because she moved to the countryside with her parents. I still remember feeling fear and anxiety when I moved for the first time in my childhood and walked on unfamiliar streets when I returned home. Moving is an adventure for children, which includes the sadness of saying goodbye to the past, familiarity, and childhood. Therefore, the mysterious town might just be a materialized childhood memory that Chihiro constructed in her mind. She wanted to complete a magnificent mourning for herself in regret of not having time to say goodbye.

She wants to wander in the past again, to encounter those people and things again; she wants to make them reappear, although they may be completely different from the ones transformed by her subconscious:

Boiler Gramps, perhaps was the grandpa who had already passed away in reality, gruff but kind-hearted, always willing to protect her. Because in the small town, Boiler Gramps had said, "She is my granddaughter."

Yubaba and Zeniba may be the image of Chihiro's grandmothers in reality, sometimes fierce, sometimes understanding; just like in the process of childhood growth, one will always find that what was thought to be unreasonable at first turns out to be gentle and lovely in the end.

No-Face, perhaps was just a boy in school who had a crush on Chihiro, secretly treating her well, willing to keep the golden heart in his mind only for her. Until the moment of separation, he returned to silence alone.

The River Spirit who came to bathe may be Chihiro's childhood memory because, in front of her house, there might really be a polluted river that she had watched as it was filled with countless debris and mud by humans. She wants to restore its clarity in her imagination.

As for the White Dragon, it is also a childhood memory that Chihiro has lost. When she was little, she fell into the Amber River and almost died, but was miraculously saved. In the small town, the boy who saved her transformed into a white dragon, becoming Chihiro's guardian.

Do you remember what Haku said to Chihiro when he first met her in Spirited Away? "I've known you since you were very small." Suddenly, everything that happened in the small town became pure. It was an inexplicable bond, a clinging to not wanting to grow up, and a past that would eventually be left behind.

Do you also remember the moving narration from Life of Pi? "Life is a continual process of letting go and moving on, but sadly, we often don't have time to say proper goodbyes." After experiencing an adventure even more fantastical than Life of Pi, Chihiro finally said goodbye to her childhood.

The road home lay ahead of her on the plain where the waves had subsided. Haku told Chihiro, "Go, and remember, never look back!" The two parted ways. At that moment, the sky was clear there were large clouds floating by. Chihiro stepped through the green grass and gullies, passed through a tunnel, and reunited with her parents in the real world. But Haku's words still echoed in her ears, "Don't look back! Don't look back!" Because there was no turning back. It was like when a family returned to their car and saw that it was filled with fallen leaves. The mother said, "Someone must have played a prank."

In fact, it wasn't people who played the prank, but time.

And that small town called Childhood was located at the origin of time. It will forever stand on the plain of memory, watching Chihiro grow further and further away. There's no need to wait for her to come back. Time is a train that only goes forward, traveling resolutely towards a place called the future in the sea of sadness. But there's no need for despair, as the end theme song Always with Me sings, "Even if there's endless sadness, we'll meet again at our destination."

So, I prefer the second story more. How about you?