# Spirited Away and cultural education (spoilers?) **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [October 7, 2002, 9:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/spirited-away-and-cultural-education-spoilers/131268 "2002-10-07T21:30:19Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 5\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Carnal\_knowledge](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/c57346/32.png) [@Carnal\_knowledge](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Carnal_knowledge)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2002, 9:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/spirited-away-and-cultural-education-spoilers/131268/1 "2002-10-07T21:30:19Z")
Saw it this past weekend and enjoyed it immensely, although I think I like Princess Mononoke better. In the original thread on this great movie, [http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?threadid=135553](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?threadid=135553) a couple of folks mentioned that there was some religious rituals and folk tale subtext that might go over the heads of the mainstream US moviegoer. I’m interested in a discussion of the specifics in the movie. Nothing really confused me about the movie, but if it was over my head, I probably wouldn’t realize it. :smack: Thanks. ---
**Author:** ![Sublight](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/439d5e/32.png) [@Sublight](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sublight)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2002, 4:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/spirited-away-and-cultural-education-spoilers/131268/2 "2002-10-08T04:58:33Z")
There may have been some religious or folkloric elements, but I don’t think anything that would make or break the movie. (pure speculation) Well, I don’t know if this would go over the head of a US viewer, but if you took out the supernatural elements, the hotel/bath resort was pretty close to what you’d see at any of the hundreds of rural and mountain hot spring resorts around Japan, including the staff wearing fairly traditional-style clothing. Perhaps it all looked odd for American viewers, but to most Japanese (and by “most Japanese” I mean my wife and mother-in-law) it was supernatural-looking creatures engaged in ordinary human activities. Also, the little stone statues that Chihiro sees as the family’s driving through the woods are quite common. Take a walk out into any woods and you stand a good chance of stumbling across a little stone Buddhist Jizo statue (or of some local deity) that looks like it’s been there for decades. ---
**Author:** ![Kyomara](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/8edcca/32.png) [@Kyomara](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kyomara)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2002, 5:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/spirited-away-and-cultural-education-spoilers/131268/3 "2002-10-08T05:24:28Z")
Yeah, that and the dragons. I mean, there’s dragons all over the place here. They don’t _fly_, of course…so I guess you could say that if your average Japanese person watched it they would just see it as an ordinary dragon, only flying. ---
**Author:** ![Sunspace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sunspace/32/1250_2.png) [@Sunspace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sunspace)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2002, 6:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/spirited-away-and-cultural-education-spoilers/131268/4 "2002-10-08T06:08:57Z")
Notice there was a _torii_ at the point where the road they’re driving up changes to a dirt track? I read in _Samurai from Outer Space: Understanding Japanese Animation_ that this signifies the entry into part of the mystical world. This movie caused my friend and I to get a library card at the [Japan Foundation](http://www.japanfoundationcanada.org/) so we could learn more… ---
**Author:** ![Kyomara](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/8edcca/32.png) [@Kyomara](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kyomara)\ **Post date:** [October 9, 2002, 7:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/spirited-away-and-cultural-education-spoilers/131268/5 "2002-10-09T07:04:26Z")
Oh yeah, and the fact that Chihiro takes a train into the Spirit World is just a hyperbolic expression of amazement at the fact that the trains here go _everywhere_. Seriously, though, what **Sublight** said. The whole complex where Chihiro works looks like a very typical old Japanese building, and all the details of her every day life (cleaning floors by running across them with rags on all fours, sleeping on _futon_, etc.) are not fantasies of the past, but still applicable to Japanese life today.