Blurring the lines between reality and fantasy, “Perfect Blue” encapsulates the horror and duality of artist versus fan obsession through its radiant color palette and ominous soundtrack.
Satoshi Kon’s “Perfect Blue” is a Japanese animated film centered around Mima Kirigoe, a former J-pop idol group member who recently shifted from the singing stage to acting on screen for a television series. As she goes further with her mature career choices, hallucinations of her past self bring into question the nature of the crimes that are happening around her.
Out of all aspects of this movie, the colors are what caught my eye first. Now, I realize that animation most of the time requires a sufficient amount of color to make the visuals truly pop; however, the usage of contrasting soft versus darker colors offered the perfect balance of realistic tones and saturated, bright shades.
Red, which is used to symbolize passion as well as aggression, appeared the most throughout the film. From little details in the background to the center-frame of the screen, the color defines the most important theme of the movie: obsession. Although, it is ironic how it does not match the titular color, blue.
One scene that utilized red was a scene where Mima was reading a script for a show she had to act in, but her manager, Rumi, advised her not to due to the contents of a specific scene. In agreeing to act in the scene, Mima exemplifies the desperation a growing artist has when attempting to achieve stardom. In turn, it fuels the obsession an artist has to be “perfect.”
While the color makes multiple appearances throughout the film, the final materialization of it is in Mima’s doppelgänger’s dress. In this red appearance, it is revealed that the doppelganger is Rumi, who was a former pop idol, and she was behind the various murders. Rumi believed she was Mima, and she thought she was protecting her image from being tarnished as a pop idol because of the true Mima’s career decisions.
Even though the color red symbolizes a portion of obsession present in the motion picture, the soundtrack places an emphasis on the sincerity and terror of such. In the fight sequence between Mima’s internet stalker, Me-Mania, and Mima herself, the music playing resembles video game music, highlighting the intensity of the scene through a sort of digital-like medium.
As this video-game-like music is also used in a scene where Mima is chasing the idol pop version of herself, this music is meant to underline another theme within the film: fan fixation within the digital age. Me-Mania stalked Mima both in real life and through a fan-site, “Mima’s Room,” which includes detailed diary entries about Mima’s daily life. This parasocial link between him and an idealized version he had of Mima only fueled his fanaticism towards her.
However, the climax of the film reveals how Rumi created the fan-site and manipulated the stalker to attack Mima. Despite the different layers embedded within the movie, it all boils down to obsession, either with outside minds regarding the idolization of Mima or within Mima herself and her path to stardom.
This film is heavily praised for its underlying symbolism and well-constructed themes, but it brings into question its influence on other films. One of the many critiques of Darren Aronofsky’s “Black Swan” is how many visual shots appear almost identical to those of “Perfect Blue.” While it is unclear if inspiration was really taken from the 1997 film, both movies revolve around obsession and perfection intertwined into artistry.
On a final note, its stake as a horror film proved fruitful with its bloody murder scenes and eerie aesthetic that makes it difficult to differentiate between dream sequences and real life. It gave off the impression of leaning more and more towards the label of body horror, whereas at times it reminded of David Cronenberg’s 1983 film “Videodrome.”
