In the last years I’ve hardly watched a handful of films, but one, recommended by a five-year-old girl, I’ve watched several times. It’s an extraordinary movie, full of symbolism. I’m talking about Spirited Away, an animated movie by the Japanese director Miyazaki. If you haven’t watched it yet, make a note on your agenda. It doesn’t disappoint and speaks to both children and adults.
The movie follows the adventures of a girl in a town inhabited by ghosts and her attempts to rescue her parents, turned into pigs by the Machiavellian old Yubaba. Beneath apparently a children’s story, runs a deeper message, the most important of adventures: The conquering of ourselves.
The ghost town represents ordinary life.
Old Yubaba represents our ego. She lives on top of a bathhouse (our body). She is constantly satisfying every whim of a giant baby, keeping him pampered, isolated from the outside in a room full of toys (our emotions).
Three identical heads jump from place to place in Yubaba’s room, a very visual way of representing the three developmental levels of our brain: reptilian, mammalian, and human (symbolized by an evil bird, the giant baby, and Yubaba respectively). In other words, our survival instincts, emotional reactions, and intelligence.
The genius of Miyazaki is in reflecting our existence in a ghost town: our life during the day is represented by the frenzied activity that takes place in the town overnight. When the sun rises over the ghost town Yubaba flies away from the bathhouse because when we go to sleep our ego seems to abandon us.
The bathhouse is home to a crowd of employees, serving the ghosts who arrive by boat every night. Logically, these employees represent the multitude of thoughts and mental activities that we have during the day to attract the wealth of ghosts (stimuli that attract our senses). Most of these employees are frogs, which, by their amphibian quality, are the ideal choice to symbolize the transition between our thoughts (water) and the corresponding materialization in actions (land).
Among the employees of the bathhouse, there are three characters who help the girl: the young Haku, the old Kamaji, and the maid Lin. Each one represents a key aspect needed for success in our spiritual conquest. Haku is a young man with powers, respected by all who live in the bathhouse, though not at ease with his situation because Yubaba has stolen his identity. He represents our potential for transformation; in fact, he is able to transform into a dragon. Between Haku and Chihiro arises a deep friendship, a pure love between the spiritual yearning and the capacity for transformation, a union that makes it possible to see through the fictional surface of the world.
Haku advises Chihiro to visit Kamaji in the boilers room at the lowest level of the bathhouse, where he works preparing aromatic waters. The old man represents the body in service of the mind, working hard to meet all her requirements. Even the cells are pictured as funny black balls that throw rocks of coal into a boiler.
Kamaji tells Chihiro to go up and talk to Yubaba because she is the one who can decide whether the human girl can stay or not. To reach the top of the house where Yubaba dwells, Chihiro has to ascend in elevators. She does so in the company of Lin, a young maid who is always grumbling, but also willing to work and help out when needed. This young lady represents our capacity for sacrifice and effort.
Yubaba reluctantly agrees to hire the girl, stealing her name and assuming that the hard work will cause her to forget it completely, in which case she will have to stay as a slave. It is interesting how Miyazaki symbolizes the power of the ego over the body and will through the ownership of personal names, masterfully illustrating that the power of the ego is conceptual, intellectual.
Chihiro’s first job is to meet a huge smelly ghost. It is time to roll up our sleeves and begin to clean our minds and bad habits. With the effort of all, including Yubaba, they manage to cleanse all the crap the ghost had attracted to himself, thus revealing his true identity: a shining spirit of a river. The thankful spirit rewards the girl with a magical ball, which she thinks of using to break the spell on her parents. This episode represents the first and hardest of spiritual works: to cleanse our minds and correct our bad habits. The reward is a new power to carry on.
The second of the ghosts she has to deal with does not seem so terrible, in fact, Chihiro invites him to enter the bathhouse. This black shadow without a face has the ability to generate gold nuggets, which draws the attention of all the employees, eager to attend to him in exchange for the gold. But the ghost, as he devours the food, begins to increase in size and rude manners to the point of swallowing up a couple of the employees. The situation gets out of control and jeopardizes the bathhouse. However, Chihiro is not tempted by his gold; on the contrary, she feels pity and feeds the ghost with half of her magic ball. The ghost begins to vomit until he is totally purified, converted back into a shadow that now follows the child submissively. Logically, this episode represents the self-control of our impulses and appetites with the power of our cleansed minds.
The young Haku, wishing to gain his freedom and that of the girl, steals a talisman from another key character: the twin sister of Yubaba, who is physically identical but lives based on the opposite principles. Yubaba’s sister represents the other side of our ego, the result of transforming intelligence into wisdom. The sister comes into the rooms of Yubaba guided by the girl, without her knowing. Once inside, she transforms the giant baby into a mouse and the wicked bird into a fly. The effect of wisdom when it enters our mind is just that, to cut through our childish emotions and negative attitudes until they become harmless aspects of our personality.
Haku, transformed into a dragon, is seriously injured during the theft of the talisman. Chihiro gives him the other half of the magic ball to heal his injuries and decides to return the talisman to Yubaba’s sister. To do so, she has to take a long train journey on the waters surrounding the ghost town, in the company of the mouse, the fly, and the no-face ghost. Finally, they arrive at a lonely train station where they are greeted by a candle that precedes them up to where Yubaba’s sister dwells in the midst of nature, in a imple and welcoming country house. The sister receives them with hospitality and invites the faceless ghost to stay for good. This episode represents the long and lonely progress until we finally encounters the light of wisdom and tame our sensual appetites.
Haku appears soon after transformed into a powerful dragon, on which Chihiro returns back to the ghost town. Whilst flying, she recognizes the true identity of Haku as the spirit of a river in which she nearly drowned as a child. When she pronounces his name, Haku remembers his full name and breaks his curse. When a person is in total control of her emotions, and her desires are governed now by wisdom, she can recognize her true divine nature.
The adventure is about to end, but Yubaba still poses the last test. She asks Chihiro to identify her parents among a group of pigs. Chihiro answers that none of them are her parents, and, indeed, all pigs were enchanted servants. At that instant, our spiritual yearning has achieved its goal and can never be again deceived by the ego and his servants thoughts. Now we are free.
Chihiro returns to the town entrance, to the starting point of the adventure, where her parents are waiting, unaware of anything that has passed. We appear to be the same, but inside we are not; our internal transformation is so profound and irreversible that our actions will always be guided by wisdom.
Note: If you think this analysis was valid, you’ll find equally revealing my research on the classical myths, or the purpose of mankind’s oldest monuments. These interpretations and many others appear in my book Voyage Zero.
24 comments
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May 12, 2019 at 2:33 pm
Stroika
Fantastic interpretation into the esoteric meaning of the film!
It’s cool to witness Miyazaki give the exoteric meaning, but to plainly see that the real meaning was not revealed publicly.
The thing that tipped me off that there had to be much deeper symbolism was Chihiro/Sen unfailingly refusing the temptations offered.
Thanks for sharing your insights.
February 12, 2019 at 6:01 pm
[THĐP Review] 5 lý do khiến Spirited Away “ám ảnh” người xem – Triết Học Đường Phố 2.0
[…] Spirited Away: An Interpretation of Its Symbolism […]
July 29, 2017 at 4:53 pm
gipsika
It was an amazing movie, when I first saw it I thought it had something of “Alice in Wonderland”. Thank you for a very profound interpretation.
September 23, 2016 at 6:16 am
Stephen
Hey Manuel,
I wanted to thank you for your article unpacking the symbolism in the movie Spirited Away. Reading your work was one of those ‘Ah-Ha’ moments for me.
Ever since I saw Guy Ritchie’s movie Revolver (2005) a few years ago I’ve been engrossed with unpacking life’s events and other movies for their ego and spiritual transformation themes.
It’s inexplicable that I failed to see Spirited Away as a movie primed for unpacking, especially since my wife and I watch it all the time. It’s one of her favorites, we even named our cat Haku! I have to admit that I must have been blinded by the assumption that the movie’s symbolism was only about the environment vs technology struggle.
I tip my hat to you,
Stephen
February 4, 2016 at 12:48 pm
Matthew gordon
So beautifully interpreted. Now I realize why I am so drawn to this film… !! What a masterpiece the subconscious is. Thank you for this, brought tears to my eyes.
December 4, 2015 at 11:15 am
jessicahanley12Jessica
Very, very good interpretation.
August 7, 2015 at 1:58 pm
Pal
Thanks for the interpretation! Great guide.
March 27, 2015 at 2:40 am
Mijn film recensies #1 - MijnBreinTV
[…] dieperliggende betekenissen te hebben, die terugwijzen naar onszelf. Zo las ik bijvoorbeeld hier een hele uitgebreide analyse. Ik weet niet zo goed wat ik er van moet vinden, interessant was het […]
September 30, 2014 at 5:36 am
Imperador Dragåo
This movie gave me lots of nighmares as a child.
February 5, 2015 at 1:17 am
zeus
Same here -.-
September 19, 2014 at 12:18 am
pnghai
Reblogged this on Góc của Hải and commented:
a great movie!
July 18, 2014 at 3:45 am
daniwhazzup
Reblogged this on Diary of a Senior student and commented:
Just to post some content in this blog.
I just watched this movie, and I was smitten once it was over. I really really REALLY recommend it to you even though it’s animation, you won’t be disappointed, it has a deeper and amazing meaning behind it, explained in this article.
June 27, 2014 at 7:39 pm
Abril
Very beautiful interpretation, by far my favorite despite what is said about the “bathhouse prostitute” reality. I feel this is much better and flows with the story, and would prefer this meaning to explain to a child of mine who can learn from it and can connect it with their own life as opposed to other interpretations and what Miyazaki might have intended.
March 20, 2014 at 1:51 am
jieshiii
Reblogged this on bloom and commented:
my favourite movie for now
December 27, 2013 at 10:39 am
Raghav
I watched the movie today and could not get any head or tail in to it . However your reveiew helped me to understand. I come from a culture of India and hinduism as a religion. The symbolisms used by miyazaki are very much related to hinduism and its ideals. Thank you for posting such a really nice intelligent analysis.
October 8, 2013 at 9:40 pm
Wondering as I wander
I agree and disagree with this explanation. Some important parts of the smelly ghost were that people didn’t want to be around it-something to delve into. Also, it wasn’t that the river was dirty, others had polluted it. It wasn’t a mental action to clean. That is the whole reason the river gave her the medicine ball-because she undid what others did. Also, Haku didn’t remember what river he was because OTHERS had done something to him, the was dried up and built over.Along with that,the spirits each represented something in our world, and the frog women were important, along with whatever spirit Lin had domain over. Finally the black specks are dust that the boiler spirit created-he said that if they didn’t work, the spell would undo itself, which is yet another important topic to delve into. I think those are important parts. Good post, with some good points missed
August 23, 2014 at 4:31 am
robosutt
Love all the different outlooks. Child prostitution is only one outlook though. Itd be sad if you overlooked all the other symbolism In the movie. Plus did u see a video of him stating that it was solely about prostitution if so link plz.
July 29, 2013 at 5:41 pm
yuki chan
It’s very inteligent what you wrote, but unfortunatly very colored in. Miyazaki admitted in an interview, that the whole movie meaning, was about prostitution in children, you should make a research about it, or just type into google ‘spirited away real meaning’ and it will pop out.
July 29, 2013 at 6:03 pm
yuki chan
oh, and as for the ball the river spirit gave her, she tasted it before on the balcony, and it was horrible, so knowing the spirit is so greedy, she knew he’ll take it and swallow it up, which will give her time to run away while he’ll be spitting it all out – in that case vomiting, and as for the ‘following’ part, Chihiro said herself to Lin that the spirit is not bad itself – it’s the bathtub making it greedy, which reflects onto how greedom and places change us, but it’s never too late to get away from all of it, and when we do, we’re pure and ready to sacrafice. The spirit reflects also to the ‘evil’ people, showing us that no person is that ‘evil’ (altho they got to that state because of us humans), but we’re all clean on the inside.
If not looking into the prostitution theme and the real meaning Miyazaki was aiming for but into the magical ‘cartoon’ world, you didn’t add much as for the Haku and Chihiro love. Haku- as the river spirit represents the way the nature is always there for us, ‘to help’, and river floods etc. are not their intentions (just as Yubaba’s power over him). You didn’t mention the sacrifice Haku made, as Yubaba said she will tear him limb from limb after he rescues her baby (again our selfish needs) but he only wants Chihiro to be safe and doesn’t care what happens to him, not knowing he’ll be free as Chihiro will remember his name.
I appologise for any mistakes I made, but english isn’t my first language.
July 30, 2013 at 12:47 am
Manuel
Thank you, Yuki. Your English is good enough (it isn’t my first language either). The magic of masterpieces like Spirited Away is that they are open to more than one valid interpretation. I also write short stories (no masterpieces :)), and sometimes the feedback i get from the readers is even more interesting than my own intention! They see things i didn’t when i wrote them. Interpretation is seeing through the filter of our experiences… my explanation of Spirited Away is, of course, colored in by my interests, but like any other… even that of the author! Thank you again for writing your own here.
April 14, 2013 at 6:47 am
Natsu
I thought it was about growing up. When its time to leave you’re parents and interact with different people, when you have to face challenges alone when you have to be independent and mature. Your review was really intelligent anyways 🙂
August 25, 2016 at 9:56 pm
Noah Dunning
I agree
April 18, 2011 at 5:04 am
Sogo
Hi, Jose. I was surprised that you watched Miyazaki animation. I watched ”Spirited Away” and thought it’s about people’s ego. I’m looking forward to seeing your new story. I hope you have a great time. See you.
April 18, 2011 at 5:15 am
Manuel
Sogo-san. Nice to read you. You, Japanese people, make such wonderful animation movies. I definitely will keep on writing about stories and personal anecdotes from Japan. Ki o tsukete kudasai!