Genre: Drama, Historical, Romance
Publisher: Madhouse Studios
Original Creator: Satoshi Kon
Director: Satoshi Kon
Producer: Kou Matsuo
Script: Satoshi Kon
Music Composer: Susumu Hirasawa
Sometimes all it takes is a single moment, a single person, a single meeting to change, or define, the course of one’s life. In the case of Chiyoko Fujiwara, that moment is when a stranger bumps into her on the street and she doesn’t turn him into the people chasing him. This man, the key he would end up leaving behind, and a promise to meet again would end up shaping the course of young Chiyoko’s life.
Millenium Actress is that Satoshi Kon movie that doesn’t really pop to mind when you think of the iconic director. It’s not as mind blowing as Paprika or as wonderfully sweet as Tokyo Godfathers, but it is still, I believe, one of his best. The movie starts with filmmaker Genya Tachibana and his cameraman, Kyoji Ida, going to interview a now elderly and long retired Chiyoko for a documentary on the film studio that she worked at during her career as an actress. When Genya gives her a key that the studio had been holding on to, Chiyoko launches into the long, melancholy tale of her search for the key’s owner. The two then travel with her through her films and life, bearing witness to a love story that seems to span centuries and reveal how her life came to revolve around chasing after that stranger with his promise to meet again when peace came.
The storytelling method can, admittedly, be a bit difficult to fully grasp at times since it frequently jumps through time, with the bulk of the story taking place in a series of flashbacks that mix reality with Chiyoko’s movies to the point that it can be hard to discern between the two. What’s great about that, though, is how Chiyoko’s movies become a reflection of her real life situations, fears, and hopes. Her movies always follow a similar set up with her character desperately chasing after her love who is wanted and presumed dead by those around her, highlighting the supposed futility of her chase. Regardless, her character desperately chases after him (with some timely help from a costumed Genya), in the hope that he is alive and they will be reunited. Whether she meets him again the the two have their happily ever after is a mystery that the movie never answers.
That same question haunts the viewers as well. Will Chiyoko and her beloved stranger meet up again? Is she chasing after someone who’s already dead? The movie almost seems to taunt us with these questions, stringing us along like Chiyoko. Caught up in her earnest and consuming desire to find this man again, you can’t help but become as caught up in her melancholy tale as Genya and Kyoji. You begin to fervently hope that someday, she’ll bump into him again or he’ll somehow, magically show up in front of her. You begin to feel the same senseless hope that has been driving Chiyoko for decades. At some point, the futility of her search strikes you, and you can’t help but admire how long she’d been able to hope and run.
Despite not going through tremendous growth, Chiyoko is fleshed out really well. The film develops the one aspect of her that is both her most complex and outstanding feature: the desire that has been keeping her going for the better part of her life. She didn’t start acting because she loved it; she started it because she thought it would bring her to her stranger. When she gets married, it isn’t out of any great love for the man, but because she had lost the key, a constant reminder of who she was chasing. Even at the end of the movie, she sees herself as merely once again picking up the chase she had grown to love.
What I liked about the chase is that it was never like Chiyoko continually kept up the optimism and hope she started out with. At one point, she breaks down in the middle of her story because she realizes she can no longer remember the face of the man who had been her first (and only) love. She has her moments of doubt and despair, even coming to accept as an adult that the man she had been so fervently chasing probably wouldn’t recognize who she’d become; she was no longer the same girl who had started out all those years ago. Her attitude and emotions humanize her and make what would be a silly and childish obsession sentimental and heart breaking; her frustration, her love, her pain, all feel so real and raw that you can’t help but care about her.
As for the bumbling Genya and the skeptical Kyoji, they serve as memorable companions to Chiyoko and her journey Genya, especially, with his unwavering admiration and love for Chiyoko is a joy to watch as he swoops in time and time again to save Chiyoko and help her characters on their way towards rescuing their respective loves. He is the gallant knight and companion whose deeds would never quite be paid back in full, but he is content in that role. He and Kyoji often provid a lightness that balanced out the melancholy of Chiyoko’s tale.
Visually, Millennium Actress remains one of the prettiest movies I’ve had to pleasure to watch. Despite being made back in 2001, its animation more than holds up 12 years later. The characters move fluidly, especially when Chiyoko is running, and it’s no wonder considering the lengths Satoshi Kon went through to make sure she ran as accurately as possible (DVD extras are treasures indeed). The attention to detail is stunning (though it’s, expectedly, nothing like Shinkai levels) and can be really appreciated in the tinted stills that Chiyoko sometimes runs through. You’d be hard pressed, I think, to find a single truly “ugly” scene. The character designs are varied and in line with the types of designs Satoshi Kon filled his movies with. I, especially, liked watching Chiyoko and those in her past age since it’s something rarely seen.
Millenium Actress is an absolute joy to watch. It has a story that you learn about and love the more you watch it. It has a lead that you can’t help but fall for despite her hopeless quest. It has a lot to love and little to really pick at. I, honestly, can’t recommend this movie enough. If you like Satoshi Kon and haven’t seen this, what are you waiting for? As for the rest of you, what are you waiting for? Satoshi Kon truly had a gift when it came to storytelling, and, though it’s a shame he passed away so young, it would be an even bigger shame for people to miss out on what he left us. Admittedly, if you’re not a fan of drama, you probably won’t like this movie too much, but I still say that everyone should at least check it out. You never know, maybe this story will worm it’s way as far into your heart as it has into mine.