Review of Paprika

For some provided context, I had no prior information surrounding the movie going into it. My girlfriend selected the movie for a date night and I went into the story with the only pretense that it was an "interesting science fiction-styled anime." Of course, if anyone really compares this story to science fiction, they will be greatly disappointed by the end of the movie. The opening of the movie was perfect. Expertly paced and shows the character "Paprika" doing what she does best. It's a great example of "Show, don't tell" in writing and allows the viewer to piece together the "technology" and its potentiallimits and dark sides without the creator of the story holding the audience's hand or "Talking down" to us. It is also here that we're introduced into the theme (or should I more accurately say "motif") of the movie. I'm saying Motif here rather than theme for two specific reasons:

1. The Theme of a piece of literature is usually a very specific moral or lesson that the author is trying to teach, with individual scenes throughout the work consistently building upon said theme. This is why when you're writing a book, if a scene has nothing to do with the all encompassing theme of the novel, you remove the scene entirely or get it "back on track" when you can. A good example of Theme is "Fellowship" in the Lord of The Rings and how the story tries to show all of the ups and downs of "Fellowship". With friends dying for you, betraying you, how friendship can span endless distances and how trust and faith can allow you to continue your job knowing your friends, halfway across the world, will do theirs just as competently. Every scene, every book, every up and down builds upon "Fellowship" and what it truly mans, with each book in the three part series against as the typical three body's of argument in a persuasive essay (with betrayals serving as argumentative rebuttals). Paprika really doesn't have this. This doesn't mean the theme failed however as I'll explain throughout this critique.

2. The "Theme" of Paprika doesn't have one specific lesson it's trying to teach outside of "Technology can be bad but also good and people can be bad but also good" which really isn't a theme in any way and is more or less the underlying tones of anything science fiction. I use the word "Motif" because although there isn't a specific lesson, every scene pertains to the nature of "Duality" and, (if there is a lesson then this might be it) that we all are struggling with the duality of inner identity (true selves) and outward identity (The mask we put on for everyone around us). Of course, this "lesson" borders on the insane ramblings of Freudian psychology throughout the movie, but luckily, the movie ends before such a "Freudian" theory can be explored more deeply. Either this is in part due to the author of the work realizing that Freudian psychology is mostly bullshit and only wanted to show basic and relatable duality of characters or the movie just wasn't long enough.

As best as I can describe without getting into too much specific detail about the story, the theme of "Paprika" is Duality. Okay, that might not be the best way to describe the theme since most people who hear "duality" in writing often think of hypocritical characters that act one way and then when it becomes convenient, they begin to act another way directly in conflict with inner desires, wishes or demands expected from others. The Duality of Paprika is far more meaningful and nuanced than that.