The New York Times released a list of the best films released since 2000, and it’s probably not a huge surprise that Bong Joon-ho’s 2019 masterpiece (and 2020’s best picture winner) “Parasite” took the top spot. The rest of the top 10 was, in my quite humble opinion, pretty great; David Lynch’s “Mulholland Drive” came in at number two, “There Will Be Blood” at number three, and exceptional films like “Get Out,” “In the Mood for Love,” and “The Social Network” rounded out the very top of the list. The ninth spot, though, belongs to the only animated movie in the top 10: “Spirited Away,” the 2001 movie by animation master Hayao Miyazaki.
After calling the film a take on Lewis Carroll’s “Alice in Wonderland” for a new generation and praising its wonderfully unique characters, the Times extolled the movie’s virtues and intention, writing, “Beautifully uniting the master animator’s preoccupations — man’s corruption of nature, the loss of innocence, intimidating creatures who aren’t what they seem — ‘Spirited Away’ is a spellbinding adventure with few peers in animation or elsewhere.”
Actor John Turturro — who you might currently know from “Severance” and who also appeared in “O Brother, Where Art Thou?” which came in 76th place on the list — put “Spirited Away” on his own top 10 ballot, and the Times encouraged the creatives who weighed in on this list to explain their thought process. “It’s a film for any child who’s lost their parents in a department store or large crowd,” Turturro wrote. “It’s that pit in your stomach. It’s one of my daughter’s favorite films. There’s a lot of things you have to watch when you’re a parent, and it’s really interesting to discover something with them at the same time.” So, for anyone who needs a refresher, what is “Spirited Away” about?
