Blog Post 3: Paprika

Blog Post 3: Paprika

Directed by Satoshi Kon, Paprika is a very interesting film about a scientist named Dr. Atsuko Chiba who at nighttime, under the code name “Paprika”, is a dream detective. The scientist also works with other colleagues who are trying to design a device called the DC Mini that is intended to help psychiatric patients. The twist is that the Mini could be used to destroy peoples’ minds should it fall into the hands of evil people.  This film was unlike any I had ever seen before.  8 ½ is the only film that shares any semblance of similarity.

So what is the DC Mini really? To many people the device is designed by psychiatric researchers to peer into the dreams of their patients. Although the device is very promising, the film carefully points out its pros and cons.  In the storyline of Paprika, terrorists steal the DC Mini during its development, and use it to implant malicious dreams into the subconscious of waking people. What we don’t find out until near the end is that the Chairman of the research facility that is developing the tool is the terrorist.

This film was sometimes so confusing that I found it hard to follow. However, I was never bored.  Even, lost, the film is intriguing. The director did not shy away from the creative opportunities inherent in an animated film; the avatars mirror the lives of regular human beings.  The characters walk and talk in their dreams and fall from one reality into another. The famous opening scene of 8½ is fantastical and original. But Satoshi Kon seems to go beyond and redefine what dreams are. The director is fascinated by the relationship between technology and our perception of reality vs. dreams. Although cautious about the intentions of technology in our everyday lives, the film carries a hopeful message that our perceptions of both dreams and reality can be positively altered through technology.

Paprika also compares the Internet with dreams. Though we usually consider the Internet to be “real” and our dreams to be “illusions,” both are products of our imagination that exist outside of our physical selves. When Detective Konakawa, a patient suffering from recurring nightmares, seems surprised to see Paprika in the site radioclub.jp, Paprika asks him “Don’t you think the Internet and dreams are very similar?” Her argument rings true. On the Internet, as in our dreams, we experience secrecy and we have a chance to create our own reality. As in dreams, we have the chance to be free of the restrictions of time, space, and our physical selves. To put it as Paprika does, “The Internet and dreams are the means of expressing the inhibitions of mankind.”

Do I agree that technology should enter our dreams, our TV screens, and our reality in the future? I don’t know but it seems so wildly different from our reality that I it wouldn’t hurt to try. Technology seems to populate our world these days that it’s hard to imagine a world with no technology in the future. Dreams are no different too. It’s a fascinating idea to make a movie about the possibilities of technology inhabiting our dreams.