Recently, a house by the tea garden in the West Lake Scenic Area in Hangzhou has suddenly become an Instagram-worthy location.

　　It turns out to be like the Bathhouse from Spirited Away.

　　Who do not like the Bathhouse?

　　Featuring a traditional Japanese bathhouse style, it is sumptuous and opulent, splendid and magnificent.

　　More importantly, it witnesses bizarre stories and a girl’s adventures.

- Spirited Away -

　　Released in 2001, Spirited Away is undoubtedly the best movie directed by Miyazaki Hayao. Combining the director’s most delicate brushwork with his most ambitious ideas, the movie is imbued with the magic of Japanese folk culture, while presenting Studio Ghibli's richest and boldest imagination. The classic Japanese animation movie will be screened at the online exhibition of 10th Beijing International Film Festival spanning from August 21 to September 22.

　　Spirited Away is an oriental equivalent of Alice in Wonderland. “神隠し” in the Japanese name is a word tinged with striking Japanese folk characteristics, meaning “hidden by the gods”.  

　　During her family's move to their new home, Chihiro, a 10-year-old girl, crosses a tunnel and inadvertently wanders into a magical world ruled by gods, witches and spirits. The moment when Chihiro's parents are turned into fat pigs, the said world reveals itself in the misty night, and then we can never take our eyes off the graphics. Everyone is enchanted by the strange, treacherous and thrilling adventure.

　　Miyazaki Hayao has said that the creation of Chihiro was inspired by the daughters of his close friends. "Some of the girls I've known since their birth are children of my friends. When they are 10 or 12 years old, I think it is time to keep a proper distance from them, so I start thinking about what kind of life these girls would have. Spirited Away is a tailored gift specifically for them.”

　　Therefore, Chihiro turns out to be a uniquely different character.  

　　Although adept at portraying girls, Miyazaki Hayao has made a majority of the female characters ideal incarnations of beauty, courage, innocence and kindness. Yet, Chihiro isn't perfect. Plain-looking and weak, she is even a little annoying when she first appears. However, during her adventure in the bizarre world, the girl grows to be brave, determined and merry.

　　Far from an adventure story about fighting against superpowers, or a simple struggle between good and evil, it is a story about learning how to survive in this world of good and evil.

　　In addition to Chihiro, the supporting cast in the film is also impressive, including the cold White Dragon, the mysterious No Face, the unkind Yubaba and the wayward Boh among others.

　　The film featuring no absolute good characters or bad ones, everyone is just an ordinary person with the vicissitudes of the past. Staying true to her original self, Chihiro becomes extraordinary as she unleashes her latent vitality. Thus, the brilliance of human nature is fully demonstrated in the film.

　　"Don't say you want to go home and hate work. Say you're willing to wait for a job opening no matter how hard it is." In the supernatural world of Spirited Away, "job" is treated with earnestness and sincerity.

　　In this world, people who don't work will be turned into animals by Yubaba. For example, Chihiro's parents are turned into pigs because of their desire for food, drooling, groaning and falling on the ground to be whipped. Working under Kamajii in the boiler room, a bunch of dust bunnies would lose their magic power if they are idle.

　　Unceasingly coaxing and pestering Yubaba, Chihiro is offered a job in the Bathhouse, and her first challenge is to give a bath for the stinky River Spirit. Yet, Chihiro does not give in, and she rises to the challenge more doggedly than anyone else, thus receiving recognition and happiness for the first time.

　　It is Miyazaki Hayao's inspirational message to girls through this film: work hard, you will get rewarded; as long as you work hard, you will gain something.

　　The opposite of hard work is endless desire. Spirited Away contains many hints of the bubble era.

　　At first, as the family stumbles into the deserted town, Chihiro's father guesses, "This must be the site of a theme park that went bankrupt after the bubble economy burst in the 1990s when there was a great bustle of masons and carpenters." Then, Chihiro's parents are immersed in the feast until they become pigs. Chihiro's parents represent the generation in the bubble era.

　　It was an era of excess wealth, as a nation was steeped in easy money and colorful bubbles, while people exuded morbid confidence. What happened then? People's material desire is endless, while the bubble bursts in a fleeting moment. The bubble burst set off an economic recession in Japan, and the Japanese call the period from 1990 to the present the "lost 20 years".

　　Chihiro was born to the generation after the bubble burst.

　　In Japan, the millennials are often referred to as Generation Y. Faced with a sluggish labor market and deficiency in the sense of hard work, the hopeless young generation needs to rebuild a special awareness. Born in 1941, Miyazaki Hayao has witnessed the ruins, recovery, take-off, prosperity and stagnation of the Japanese economy, and perhaps it pains him more than anyone else to see the new generation living in the current era.

　　“As long as you work hard, you will be rewarded.” An inspiring fable for the Generation of Chihiro, Spirited Away is full of encouragements and wishes from elders.