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Stars indicate the most critically-acclaimed movies.

97
4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days
83
Alexandra
43
Anamorph
35
Babysitters, The
32
Backseat
80
Band's Visit, The
62
Battle for Haditha
47
Bella
63
Blind Mountain
71
Blindsight
47
Boarding Gate
63
Body of War
58
Bra Boys
70
Caramel
54
Cashback
44
Chaos Theory
32
Chapter 27
69
Chicago 10
82
Chop Shop
46
CJ7
78
Counterfeiters, The
30
Cover
48
Dark Matter
35
Deal
61
Dhamma Brothers, The
92
Diving Bell and the Butterfly, The
73
Duchess of Langeais, The
20
Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed
58
Fall, The
43
Favor, The
58
First Saturday in May, The
57
Flawless
87
Flight of the Red Balloon, The
xx
From Within
44
Frontier(s)
59
Fugitive Pieces
41
Funny Games
66
George A. Romero's Diary of the Dead
61
Girls Rock!
55
Glass: A Portrait of Philip in Twelve Parts
57
Grand, The
58
Hats Off
68
Honeydripper
xx
Jack and Jill vs. the World
67
Jellyfish
xx
Kiss the Bride
37
Life Before Her Eyes, The
72
Life of Reilly, The
50
Look
65
Married Life
35
Meet Bill
63
Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day
54
Mister Lonely
52
My Blueberry Nights
71
My Brother Is an Only Child
49
Noise
61
OSS 117: Cairo - Nest of Spies
83
Paranoid Park
55
Pathology
48
Penelope
90
Persepolis
62
Planet B-Boy
xx
Plumm Summer, A
67
Praying with Lior
44
Previous Engagement, A
72
Priceless
17
Prom Night
69
Redbelt
72
Roman de gare
48
Run, Fat Boy, Run
85
Savages, The
24
Sex and Death 101
66
Shelter
75
Shotgun Stories
40
Sleepwalking
67
Snow Angels
64
Son of Rambow
71
Standard Operating Procedure
76
Stuff and Dough
64
Surfwise
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Tashan
82
Taxi to the Dark Side
57
Teeth
56
Then She Found Me
55
Tracey Fragments, The
56
Turn the River
72
Tuya's Marriage
83
U2 3D
59
Under the Same Moon
76
Unforeseen, The
xx
Unsettled
91
Up the Yangtze
55
Vice
79
Visitor, The
64
Water Lilies
45
Where in the World Is Osama Bin Laden?
57
Without the King
74
Witnesses, The
63
XXY
67
Year My Parents Went on Vacation, The
75
Young@Heart
45
Zombie Strippers
97
4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days
92
Diving Bell and the Butterfly, The
91
Up the Yangtze
90
Persepolis
87
Flight of the Red Balloon, The
85
Savages, The
83
Paranoid Park
83
Alexandra
83
U2 3D
82
Chop Shop
82
Taxi to the Dark Side
80
Band's Visit, The
79
Visitor, The
78
Counterfeiters, The
76
Unforeseen, The
76
Stuff and Dough
75
Young@Heart
75
Shotgun Stories
74
Witnesses, The
73
Duchess of Langeais, The
72
Roman de gare
72
Priceless
72
Tuya's Marriage
72
Life of Reilly, The
71
My Brother Is an Only Child
71
Blindsight
71
Standard Operating Procedure
70
Caramel
69
Redbelt
69
Chicago 10
68
Honeydripper
67
Snow Angels
67
Praying with Lior
67
Year My Parents Went on Vacation, The
67
Jellyfish
66
George A. Romero's Diary of the Dead
66
Shelter
65
Married Life
64
Surfwise
64
Son of Rambow
64
Water Lilies
63
XXY
63
Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day
63
Body of War
63
Blind Mountain
62
Planet B-Boy
62
Battle for Haditha
61
Dhamma Brothers, The
61
OSS 117: Cairo - Nest of Spies
61
Girls Rock!
59
Under the Same Moon
59
Fugitive Pieces
58
First Saturday in May, The
58
Fall, The
58
Hats Off
58
Bra Boys
57
Flawless
57
Teeth
57
Without the King
57
Grand, The
56
Turn the River
56
Then She Found Me
55
Vice
55
Tracey Fragments, The
55
Pathology
55
Glass: A Portrait of Philip in Twelve Parts
54
Cashback
54
Mister Lonely
52
My Blueberry Nights
50
Look
49
Noise
48
Run, Fat Boy, Run
48
Dark Matter
48
Penelope
47
Bella
47
Boarding Gate
46
CJ7
45
Where in the World Is Osama Bin Laden?
45
Zombie Strippers
44
Frontier(s)
44
Chaos Theory
44
Previous Engagement, A
43
Anamorph
43
Favor, The
41
Funny Games
40
Sleepwalking
37
Life Before Her Eyes, The
35
Meet Bill
35
Babysitters, The
35
Deal
32
Backseat
32
Chapter 27
30
Cover
24
Sex and Death 101
20
Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed
17
Prom Night
xx
Tashan
xx
Unsettled
xx
Plumm Summer, A
xx
Kiss the Bride
xx
Jack and Jill vs. the World
xx
From Within
Stars indicate the most critically-acclaimed movies.
|
Spirited Away
Walt Disney Pictures / Buena Vista Pictures
FILM:
MPAA RATING: PG for some scary moments
Starring
Daveigh Chase,
Michael Chiklis,
Susan Egan,
Lauren Holly,
Jason Marsden,
John Ratzenberger,
and
Suzanne Pleshette
From the legendary director Hayao Miyazaki ("Princess Mononoke"), this film follows the fanciful adventures of a ten-year-old girl named Chihiro, who discovers a secret world when she and her family get lost and venture through a hillside tunnel. (Walt Disney Studios)
| GENRE(S): |
Fantasy
|
| WRITTEN BY: |
Hayao Miyazaki
|
| DIRECTED BY: |
Hayao Miyazaki
|
| RELEASE DATE: |
DVD: April 15, 2003
Video: April 15, 2003
Theatrical: September 20, 2002
|
| RUNNING TIME: |
124 minutes, Color |
| ORIGIN: |
Japan |
| LANGUAGE(S): |
Japanese (dubbed in English) |
Original title "Sen to Chihiro no kamikakushi"; Winner, Best Animated Feature, 75th Annual Academy Awards; Best Film (tie), 2002 Berlin International Film Festival; Best Asian Film, 2002 Hong Kong Film Awards; All-time highest grossing-film in Japan

All critic scores are converted to a 100-point scale. If a critic does not indicate a score, we assign a score based on the general impression given by the text of the review. Learn more...
100
Baltimore Sun
Michael Sragow
A visual masterpiece about a scared little girl's breathtaking journey of self-discovery. All of the fun is getting there.

100
Charlotte Observer
Lawrence Toppman
Yet its visual surrealism, identity-bending and strong social/ecological message make it as much an allegory as a fable.

100
New York Daily News
Jack Mathews
Turns everything we know about the contemporary world on its head, and substitutes it with one in which spirits, monsters, magicians and animals mix it up in a carnival of energy, good humor and freewheeling illusion.

100
New Times (L.A.)
Luke Y. Thompson
Probably like nothing you've ever seen before. In a cool world, it would be guaranteed not only the Best Animated Feature Oscar, but Best Picture as well.
100
TV Guide
Frank Lovece
Serenely stunning.

100
Philadelphia Inquirer
Steven Rea
Wondrously strange and just plain wonderful.

100
New York Post
Lou Lumenick
A Japanese cross between "Alice in Wonderland" and "The Wizard of Oz" -- is such a landmark in animation that labeling it a masterpiece almost seems inadequate.

100
Entertainment Weekly
Lisa Schwarzbaum
A triumph of psychological depth and artistic brilliance offered as the magical adventures of one skinny little girl.

100
LA Weekly
David Chute
Does full honor to Miyazaki’s teeming and often unsettling landscape, and to the conflicted complexity of his characters: Not a single frame was cut, and the voice casting and performances are uniformly excellent.

100
Time
Richard Corliss
Artful but not arty, Spirited Away is a handcrafted cartoon, as personal as an Utamaro painting, yet its breadth and heart give it an appeal that should touch American viewers of all ages.

100
Portland Oregonian
Shawn Levy
Miyazaki is a genius, and this film is a masterpiece; go see it.
100
Variety
Derek Elley
An out-and-out charmer. It's almost impossible to do justice in words either to the visual richness of the movie, which melanges traditional Japanese clothes and architecture with both Victorian and modern-day artifacts, or to the character-filled storyline, with human figures, harpies and grotesque creatures.

100
Los Angeles Times
Kenneth Turan
Prepare to be astonished by Spirited Away.

100
Wall Street Journal
Joe Morgenstern
It is plainly, though not simply, a masterpiece from an acknowledged master of contemporary animation, and a wonderfully welcoming work of art that's as funny and entertaining as it is brilliant, beautiful and deep.
100
Chicago Sun-Times
Roger Ebert
It's enchanting and delightful in its own way, and has a good heart. It is the best animated film of recent years, the latest work by Hayao Miyazaki, the Japanese master who is a god to the Disney animators.

100
New York Magazine
Peter Rainer
The most deeply and mysteriously satisfying animated feature to come along in ages.

100
Empire
Patrick Peters
The fact that Miyazaki and his team hand-draw the images before they're digitally coloured and animated gives them an artistry that has been woefully lacking from so many recent American features.

100
Dallas Observer
Luke Y. Thompson
It would be a masterpiece in any language.

100
USA Today
Claudia Puig
Director Hayao Miyazaki treats his audience as imaginative and intelligent human beings, rather than catering to kids with rote displays of silliness, stunts and scares.

90
The New York Times
A.O. Scott
The towering, lost dreaminess at the heart of the film is an unmistakable obsession of this director.

90
The Hollywood Reporter
David Hunter
Spirited dazzles and entertains like no other movie this year. It also comes to a satisfying conclusion and never once seems to take shortcuts. Miyazaki is one of world cinema's most wondrously gifted artists and storytellers.

90
Chicago Reader
Ted Shen
Enchanting and impressively crafted.

90
The Onion (A.V. Club)
Tasha Robinson
A wonderful encore, marked by the painstaking attention to detail and artful balance between terror and joy that make Miyazak's work unique.

90
Village Voice
J. Hoberman
A very nutty fruitcake, Spirited Away is characterized by wonderfully detailed animation, packed with incident and populated by all manner of comic creatures.

89
Austin Chronicle
Marc Savlov
Fiercely original in every respect.

88
ReelViews
James Berardinelli
Overall, while Spirited Away may not be as complex and imaginative as "Princess Mononoke" in some areas, it is as beautifully rendered and no less sophisticated in its outlook. Miyazaki has provided another triumph, and, in the midst of the quality fall-off of Disney’s in-house animated projects, a reason for animation-lovers to rejoice.

88
Chicago Tribune
Michael Wilmington
It's a movie full of bewitching images and timeless fun and beauty.

88
Miami Herald
Rene Rodriguez
Offers a ride worth taking -- an excursion through a fantastical pop universe that is pure, enchanting magic. Try it; you'll like it.

88
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)
Don Irvine
The most successful film ever released in Japan, and co-winner of the top prize at this year's Berlin film festival, Spirited Away is a complete reversal of the Hollywood way with animation.

80
Washington Post
Jane Horwitz
Old myths and wonder tales spun afresh.

80
Salon.com
Andrew O'Hehir
It will disturb you as much as thrill you, make you wonder whether the boundaries between life and death, reality and fantasy, imagination and insanity are ever what they appear to be.

80
Washington Post
Desson Thomson
This movie -- which is equally appealing to children (those of adventurous, non-freak-outable spirit), Japanese animation (anime) fans, and any surviving acquaintances of Timothy Leary -- is so full of invention, you might want to take a breather now and then.

75
Seattle Post-Intelligencer
William Arnold
Has the power to transport us to a different place. The spark of special anime magic here is unmistakable and hard to resist.

75
San Francisco Chronicle
C.W. Nevius
A lovely, evocative tour de force. So why does it seem we should be enjoying it more?

75
Christian Science Monitor
David Sterritt
Too intense for the youngest viewers, but teenagers will enjoy it -- an ill-smelling "stink-god" character is almost worthy of a Kevin Smith gross-out movie -- and grown-ups should find it diverting, if not exactly deep.

75
Boston Globe
Wesley Morris
Delivers chunks of ''Yellow Submarine'' and ''The Phantom Tollbooth'' -- a vividly timeless oddity suitable for many children and most stoners.


The average user rating for this movie is 9.4 (out of 10) based on 572 User Votes
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