Paprika (Satoshi Kon, 2006, Japan, 91 minutes)
Capping off Kon’s incredible and all-too-short career, Paprika follows the title character, a mysterious red-haired woman who is able to enter people’s dreams via a new and unregulated device called the DC Mini. Paprika is the dream persona of Dr. Atsuko Chiba, who works at the Foundation for Psychiatric Research alongside the inventor of the DC Mini, Kosaku Tokita, and the plot takes off when three DC Minis are stolen. Here Kon is at the height of his visual inventiveness, and with film programmers seeing opportunity after the success of Hayao Miyazaki’s recent movies in the West, it was given berths in prestigious international film festivals (including Venice and New York) before receiving a nationwide release in America in 2007.
Paprika is available to watch for free to current Webster University students, faculty, and staff through the Webster U. library here. Alternatively, it can be rented digitally on most platforms for $3-4.
With a free post-film discussion on May 27 at 7:00 p.m. from Justin Sevakis, anime professional of 22 years and CEO of production company MediaOCD.