SPOILER ALERT
Plot details follow for Perfect Blue!
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| Image used for criticism under Fair Use. All rights to Manga Entertainment. |
"The persona is a complicated system of relations between individual consciousness and society, fittingly enough a kind of mask, designed on the one hand to make a definite impression upon others, and, on the other, to conceal the true nature of the individual."
- Carl Jung, "The Relations between the Ego and the Unconscious."
"Men look at women. Women watch themselves being looked at."
- John Berger, Ways Of Seeing
"Who are you?"
Too many people view celebrities as public property. Once you achieve a certain amount of fame, you enter into the public domain, an object to be fetishized, judged, and worshiped. This sickening obsession has not abated an inch since the 20th century, and with the onset of social media, has only exacerbated.
Although Perfect Blue is set in Japan, so many of its observations can carry over to the United States, and I imagine, much of the world. Before watching this film, I had viewed most celebrities, particularly those in pop music, with condescension. I often saw them as entitled, talentless, narcissistic, and just plain ignorant. However, in spite of my personal reservations, Perfect Blue helped me realize these celebrities are, well, people. They may not the same problems that you and I have, but they still have problems. These are problems of a different sort, that are in some cases, worse than ours. There's a constant, publicized pressure on celebrities not to gain weight, say all the right things on every position, and spill the juicy details of their sex lives. Everywhere you may go, cameras, cameras, cameras, all capturing wardrobe malfunctions, your face without makeup, and a personal date on the beach. Is it really any wonder that hackers leak celebrity nude photos in this toxic environment? The media practically encourages it. With fame comes the loss of privacy. This privacy may be returned, somewhat, should the public have an attention span too short for your antics. You find yourself reduced to the occasional butt of the joke for a late night talk show host.
Persona and Simulacra
Perfect Blue's leading star Mima Kirigue, is a pop singer for the group CHAM, which is on the wane. While Japanese pop idol groups may seem insufferable today, with their irritable high-pitched squeals, during the 1990s (when this film was released), they seemed ready to vanish altogether. The preceding decade was seen as the golden age for pop idols, who flourished on prime-time television shows. As entertainment reporter, Masaru Nashimoto, told The Japan Times, "TV is about the only medium idols were born in, and talent agencies sought to maximize their appearances as much as possible," (Matsutani). By the 90s, however, the act was getting tired and with the rise of the Internet, anyone could be an idol and bypass the traditional gatekeeper of a talent agency. What defines an idol has diffused into something more ambiguous, with so many out there, and some, like Hatsune Miku, made purely out of pixel. The idols made a comeback, however, in the mid-2000s, with the mega-group, AKB48, rising to prominence in 2007. The appeal of idols isn't just in their superficial music, but also in presenting a fantasy of adolescent love. It's a fantasy that cannot be violated without severe personal cost, as dating for these idols is banned. AKB48's Minami Minegishi, who was unfortunate enough to be caught breaking this taboo, felt so overwhelmed with shame that she shaved her head and publicly apologized. Idols exist to project a fantasy, and Mima wishes to exchange this fantasy for another, as an actress.
Mima, like many pop idols in the 90s, tries to transition to more serious work, but the trouble is that pop idols aren't taken very seriously. Try as she might to be Mima "the actress", she'll always be seen as Mima "the idol." This is particularly made evident when she's dressed up in an outfit similar to her "idol" one for the erotic rape scene. Can Mima ever completely change her identity from pop star to actress, or does she have an independent identity separate from either occupation? It all brings back to mind Tyler Durden's adage in the film, Fight Club, "You are not your job." What belies this statement is the sentiment that your occupation doesn't define who you are, and that your "true" identity exists separately from your public persona. This is a statement that is both true and false. It is true insofar that there is more to a person than what they do to pay the bills, but it is false insofar that it denies a person's occupation as a part of their identity. When I say "Michael Jackson", you think, "musician." When I say "Leonardo Da Vinci", you think, "painter." When I say "Marlon Brando", you think, "actor." This isn't to say that a person can't be versatile in multiple fields, as was evident from Da Vinci, but as far as the public is concerned, his persona is first and foremost as that of an artist who painted "Mona Lisa" and "The Last Supper." Changing your identity to suit yourself does not so easily shift your persona in the eyes of the public. Joe Scarborough's new ventures into rock music won't change his long-held persona as the host of Morning Joe. Of course, there are counter examples. Marky Mark went from an obnoxious rapper to Oscar-worthy acting talent Mark Wahlberg. It is a transformation so successful that many who know him mostly for acting are ignorant of his past life. Even so, this does little to affirm Durden's statement, "You're not your job." Wahlberg's jobs may have changed, but he is still very much, as far as the public is concerned, an actor, and little else. So the relevant question is this, does changing jobs change you as a person? Did becoming Mark Wahlberg change Marky Mark into a different person, or is he still the same person behind a different veneer?
That question is the central thesis of the film. Should Mima define herself on the basis of what she does or on the basis of how the public receives her? The popular public perception of Mima, the one which her most ardent fans wish to preserve, is manifested online through the website "Mima's Room." Her most obsessed fan, Me-Mania, believes that the digital Mima, the Mima as he loves her, is more "real" than the one who left pop to be an actress. Mima herself even starts to hallucinate seeing this version. She looks happier, freer. When a person makes a radical shift in what they do, they often start back from square one, and have to build a new reputation from scratch. They are born again. Mima is so blinded, as we all are, by the success of her past self, that she forgets the mountain of failures it took to get her there. In any case, the prospect of creating a digital celebrity persona that behaves in a manner indistinguishable from the real thing, or rather, our popular perception of it, is not too far off. Computers brought Tupac back to rap with Snoop Dogg and Dr. Dre at Coachella, Audrey Hepburn back to sell Galaxy Chocolate, Bruce Lee back to sell Johnnie Walker, and Peter Cushing back to reprise his role as Grand Moff Tarkin in Rogue One. As disturbed as we may be by this technological necromancy, I can only see its abuse continue for the near future. It will go beyond, say, having Jimi Hendrix back in concert to play "Purple Haze" or George Carlin back on stage to repeat his "Seven Words" routine. We'll have whole genres of films and television featuring dead celebrities. Horror films with Bela Lugosi. Sitcoms with Lucille Ball. Comedies with the Marx Brothers. Westerns with John Wayne. Musicals with Rogers and Astaire. Pornos with Marilyn Monroe. Don't fool yourself into thinking that music and literature will be exempt from this necrophilia. Artificial intelligence has already proven to be able to compose music and write books, so who's to say we won't have A.I. that can mimic the styles of dead artists to pen a new Shakespeare play or finish Schubert's Eighth? We've already had a computer write a new Game Of Thrones novel for fans too impatient with George R.R. Martin. The celebrity is not a human being, they never were. They are but another commodity to be bought, sold, and repurposed however one wishes. Technology will only elevate this trend.
Mima is an object, and by everyone she is objectified. The most blatant objectifier is Me-Mania, who is an "otaku" in the truest sense of the word. While "otaku" has come to refer to anime fans, in the original Japanese, it was a derogatory term for obsessed enthusiasts. Someone obsessed with trains, for instance, was a "train otaku." Me-Mania is a "Mima otaku." That obsession leads to a feeling of ownership, particularly a sexual one. Society pressures celebrity women to open up sexually, because many feel entitled to their sexuality, from their relationships, to their nudity, to their orgasm. Me-Mania is, in this sense, a bit of a scapegoat, because he is only but the end result of a culture of objectification complicit in us all. The filmmakers objectify Mima as much as Me-Mania does, in fact, theirs is is far more pernicious, because it hides behind the veneer of artistic expression. The screenwriter, not impressed with Mima's acting, decides to throw her into an eroticized rape scene, and though we know it not to be real, it feels real. The lustful faces of actors as they see her strip on display, perhaps an unmasking of how the filmmakers truly see Mima. They value her flesh more than her talent. Me-Mania attempts to rape Mima in the very spot where the scene was filmed, revealing the connective tissue between desire in fiction and desire in real life. A softer violation occurs when Mima is pressured into posing nude for a magazine. The photos are tasteful and artistic, with Mima smiling all the way through, but again, this too, is a fantasy. Not long after, there's a poignant moment where we see Mima huddled in the bath, perhaps trying to reclaim her stolen nakedness. I enjoy sexual imagery as much as the next person, but Perfect Blue asks of you to scrutinize these images, how much of this was really done out of the women's consent, and how much is more a woman being contorted to fit into another's demand? I am reminded of Bernardo Bertolucci's surprise rape scene of Maria Schneider in The Last Tango In Paris, Hugh Hefner using Marilyn Monroe's nudes without permission to launch Playboy, Paul Verhoeven filming Sharon Stone's vagina without her knowledge in Basic Instinct, and Harvey Weinstein pressuring Salma Hayek into a sex scene in Frida. It isn't a coincidence, either, that when the screenwriter and the photographer are murdered, they are both stabbed in the eyes, the photographer also in the crotch. While they both went about objectifying her differently, but they objectified her all the same.
Before concluding, I may as well mention that Perfect Blue was the probable inspiration for Darren Aronofsky's Black Swan. It similarly stars a woman driven to succeed in the arts, but suffers from a psychological state that confuses fantasy and reality. Black Swan also brings to mind Dario Argento's Suspiria, which had an aspiring ballerina go to a ballet school, that is unbeknownst to her a witches' coven. Black Swan, however, is more about sexual awakening and artistic passion, than it is about celebrity personas and institutional sexism. While the sex in Black Swan is erotic, it certainly didn't seem to go anywhere, with awkward moments like Nina getting assaulted by her teacher, who seems to develop something of a relationship with her. Further, Black Swan never quite reaches the level that Perfect Blue does of leaving the viewer completely confused over what's real and what isn't. Yet for all it's flaws, Black Swan, at least, had a resolution, and a beautiful one at that, with Nina possibly dying for her art, which is more than can be said for the mess that is the ending of Perfect Blue.
Perfect Blue makes a similar mistake that Fatal Attraction did in its climax, resolving its conflicts through a violent slasher ending. The resolution starts off with a very interesting twist, that it was Mima's manager, Rumi, who was behind the murders. Like Me-Mania, she feels just as entitled to own the image of Mima, the "pop idol." She, too, was an objectifier. There's an exciting chase through the streets, but it all awkwardly ends with Rumi in a mental ward, and Mima laughing to herself that she knows who she is. It feels more like a Hollywood mandated ending than a true resolution, and to be frank, comes off as rather insulting, given the psychological trauma that Mima had just suffered prior. Just as Fatal Attraction brought up interesting questions of obsession and marital infidelity, it turns Glenn Close into a Psycho knock-off, and we're left to assume that Michael Douglas and Anne Archer go back to being a happy family. Similarly, the problems and contradictions raised by Perfect Blue are far more interesting than how they are resolved. We never know why she suffered those hallucinations, if she was able to successfully the transition from pop star to actress, if she even wants to inhabit either of these roles, and how she intends to deal with the sexism still evident in the entertainment industry. Instead, Mima is freed from this burden of difficult self-examination by laying all the blame on someone else. She may know who she is, but we certainly don't. Mima, who are you?
Mima's personal troubles aside, the broader questions that the film makes about society are left hanging in the air. Is your identity what you do, how society sees you, how you see yourself, or a combination of the three? Can a person hold separate identities without one bleeding into the other? What is the boundary between reality and fiction, in a world where fiction increasingly mimics reality? How much does what we see in the media inform the way we see the world? Is fiction always presented as fiction? Should it be? Is reality always presented as reality? Should it be? These questions are not answered in the film, but perhaps, if we're honest, they never will be.
The Art Of Anime
"When Did Mimi Get So Cute?"
http://sansuthecat.blogspot.com/2016/05/when-did-mimi-get-so-cute.html
"Evangelion, Or Something Like It."
http://sansuthecat.blogspot.com/2015/10/evangelion-or-something-like-it.html
"Yuri Vincit Omnia."
http://sansuthecat.blogspot.com/2015/03/puella-magi-madoka-magica-yuri-vincit.html
"FLCL: Insanity Defined."
http://sansuthecat.blogspot.com/2014/10/flcl-insanity-defined.html
"Barefoot In The Park."
https://sansuthecat.blogspot.com/2017/01/barefoot-in-park.html
"Sakura No Aware."
https://sansuthecat.blogspot.com/2017/06/sakura-no-aware.html
Bibliography
Kon, Satoshi, dir. Perfect Blue. Manga Entertainment, 2000. Film. DVD.
Matsutani, Minoru. "Pop 'idol' phenomenon fades into dispersion." The Japan Times, August 25, 2009. Web. https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2009/08/25/news/pop-idol-phenomenon-fades-into-dispersion/#.Wka1HXlG3IU
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