History Anime / SpiritedAway

* BalefulPolymorph:
** Chihiro's parents and the other humans turned into pigs. They show no sign of being anything more than mud-rolling, omnivorous animals after.
** Zeniba turns Boh (Yubaba's son and Zeniba's nephew) and Yubaba's servant into a mouse and a tiny bird, respectively. When Chihiro later asks her to change them back, she says that the spell has worn off, and they can change back any time they want. (They don't choose to until later.)

* JerkassHasAPoint: Even for a then [[SpoiledBrat spoiled kid]], Chihiro has the right idea when she tells her parents not to eat the food they find in the abandoned town. After all, they didn't really know if they could afford to pay for even a portion of the food they ate. In this case, [[BalefulPolymorph the price was too high]].

* WhamShot: Chihiro's parents turning away from their SchmuckBanquet to reveal [[BalefulPolymorph they've been turned into pigs]]. It's at this point both Chihiro and the audience realize things have turned FromBadToWorse, and that she won't be leaving the area anytime soon.

** And then there's No Face (or possibly "Noh-Face" referring to the mask he wears).

* NameFaceName: No-Face, a featureless black spirit that literally has no face, only a mask to represent one.

* AmbiguouslyHuman: Some of the spirits have a human like appearance to them, with some such as Lin and Haku, looking nigh distinguishable from normal humans. However, even the more human-like spirits have traits and attributes (subtle or otherwise_ that make it clear that they're not really human.

** The spirit world, being mostly nature-associated, is being gradually hemmed in by redevelopment, with especially tragic consequences for river spirits.
*** Sadly true in reality, in that almost all rivers in Japan that go even remotely close to developed areas are turned into straight and narrow concrete troughs. The concrete is even crawling up the sides of hills and mountains.

The fact that it won [[UsefulNotes/AcademyAward the Oscar]] for Best Animated Feature Film (and, currently, is the only traditionally animted film as well as the only anime film to do so) should be noted, as the Oscars tend to favor [[AllCGICartoon CGI]] and/or American productions.

Not to be confused with the Australian TV show ''Series/{{Spirited}}'', the 1974 film ''Swept Away'', that film's 2002 remake[=/=]Music/{{Madonna}} vehicle, or the [[Creator/DreamworksAnimation DreamWorks]] film ''WesternAnimation/SpiritStallionOfTheCimarron''.

** You can't tell in English, but Chihiro's parents should really have known better than to eat in a "park" where the signs advertise such foods as "dog" and "[[ImAHumanitarian eyeball]]". Not to mention that they really should have waited to pay before engorging themselves, and they kept insisting that there was nothing weird or supernatural about the 'park'. It's pretty easy even for someone who doesn't read or speak Japanese to tell that there's something ungodly stupid about what they're doing. It can be theorized that the enchantments on the food are probably what causes them to engorge themselves, though they still fell for the SchmuckBanquet big time.

* BerserkButton: Yubaba is surly at the best of times, but when she discovers [[spoiler: her baby son was missing]] she becomes ''terrifying.'' Fire explodes from her mouth and she nearly chokes Haku with her PrehensileHair.

* BoyMeetsGhoul: Chihiro, a normal everyday human girl, and Haku, a person of the spirit world [[spoiler:(who turns out to be a river spirit.))]]

* CharacterDevelopment: Chihiro starts the story as a sullen, moody preteen not wanting to face change. Then she [[spoiler:starts working at the bathhouse, makes friends, and rescues Haku from Zeniba]]. By the end, she's much more appreciative of her parents and responsible for her actions. The English dub goes further by the last line of the film saying, "I think I can handle it" about her new school.

* ComfortingComforter: Kamaji does this when Chihiro falls asleep in the boiler room. Guess he's [[JerkWithAHeartOfGold not such a bad guy]] after all. D'aaaw....

* DisproportionateRetribution: Chihiro's parents eat food that has been left out in the open in unattended booths (that look just like food service stalls) and are fully willing to pay for it if an owner appears. So naturally they deserve to be turned into pigs, right? (Of course, Humans might consider it Disproportionate Retribution, but seeing as this is a common theme in stories among [[TheFairFolk fairies and spirits]], such beings [[BlueAndOrangeMorality apparently do not.]])

* DistressedDude: Haku was heavily injured from [[spoiler: Zeniba]]'s spell, needing both [[spoiler: [[ChekhovsGun medicine from the water god]]]] and Chihiro's [[ThePowerOfLove love]] to save him.

* DragonRider: Chihiro briefly gets to take a ride on [[spoiler:the dragon Haku]].

* EndOfAnAge: A subtle one about cultural traditions eroding: Chihiro doesn't recognize roadside shrines or understand the traditional etiquette, and the formerly [[{{Reincarnation}} two-way]] AfterlifeExpress now goes only one direction. The [[ImageSong image album]] has the workers lament that fewer and fewer gods show up every year, as they're slowly dying out, and "there are no gods in electric things."

** The cleansed river spirit moves in a sinuous, looping way that is reminiscent of flowing water after he is outside of the bath house, which [[spoiler:Haku's dragon form also emulates in flight; only natural, since Haku himself turns out to be a river spirit]].

* ForgottenFirstMeeting: [[spoiler:Haku, a river spirit, saved Chihiro when she fell into the river as a child. Chihiro remembers this only when they are [[FreeFallRomance flying through the sky together]] near the end of the film, which causes Haku to remember his identity too.]]

** During the [[spoiler: cleansing of the River Spirit]], Yubaba demonstrates an ability to float in mid-air; given her enormous head, she might qualify for this trope.

* GoldFever: All of the employees at the bathhouse go crazy trying to pick up the gold No-Face drops, although it turns out to not be enough to cover the damage he causes in the end. Not to mention that it turns out to be [[spoiler: made of dirt.]]

** Yubaba, her baby, and [[spoiler:her sister]]. There are two scenes with Yubaba nose-to-nose with normal (not super-deformed) characters, and her head is taller than Haku's head and torso combined.

** This movie has an unusually subtle one for Miyazaki: a "stink spirit" comes to visit the bathhouse, and the bathhouse workers try to turn him away because he is so rank. [[spoiler: The "stink spirit" is actually the spirit of a polluted river, and after Chihiro gives him a bath and, with others' help, de-pollutes him, Chihiro is rewarded with the medicine that later helps both Haku and No-Face.]]

* HeroicBystander: Believe it or not, the Soot Spirits get to be this! When [[spoiler: Yubaba's]] cursing slug tries to escape, the little balls of soot team up to block their tunnels, keeping the creature from getting away and allowing Chihiro to kill it.

* IGaveMyWord: This actually happens ''twice'' in the span of ten minutes at the climax of the story. First, [[spoiler: Boh tries to convince Yubaba to release Chihiro and her parents without testing Chihiro, and she almost considers it; however, Chihiro insists that she be tested, saying that a deal is a deal (even though she is not the one who actually made the deal). Second, Chihiro ends up passing the test, despite the fact that Yubaba made it extra tricky (she has to identify her parents in a large group of pigs and correctly guesses that it's ''none'' of them) and Yubaba keeps her end of the bargain by voiding her contract.]]

* LossOfIdentity: Yubaba steals the names of anyone who works for her, thus taking their memories of their past and their real name. Even Chihiro, who was in the spirit world for a day, had nearly forgotten her name until reminded. In fact, Haku is trying to free himself from Yubaba's contract by remembering who he is as well. But for [[ThePowerOfLove some reason]], [[spoiler: he was only able to recall Chihiro]].

** The movie itself: ''Sen to Chihiro,'' or "Sen and Chihiro," -- two different people.

** Haku, while having its own meaning, also sounds very close to the Japanese word for "100", Hyaku. This goes rather well with Chihiro's new name, Sen, meaning "1000".
* MindScrew: '''Big time.''' This was lampshaded by Creator/CartoonNetwork's ads for it, which, after explaining how Chihiro got stuck in an alternate universe, her parents turned into pigs, and she sold her name to a "crazy witch lady," the narrator goes on to say, "And that's just the first twenty minutes!"

* NoOSHACompliance: The bathhouse has a steep, rickety wooden stair along the outside of the building, overlooking a deep trench. Chihiro's lucky she slid straight down ... into a wall.

** Yubaba gets another one when she's told that [[spoiler: Boh is with her sister Zeniba.]]

* OurDragonsAreDifferent: [[spoiler: Haku AKA Kohaku]] is in fact a river spirit. This makes sense since in Eastern mythology, dragons are more strongly associated with water than fire. As a dragon styled on Japanese myth, he has a wolf's head, feelers like a koi or catfish, antlers like a deer or elk, a serpentine body, and bird-like legs.

* ParentsKnowTheirChildren: Inverted. [[spoiler: To rescue her parents, Chihiro must pick them out of a line-up of several dozen other pigs. She correctly determines that none of the pigs are her parents.]]

* ThePowerOfLove: [[spoiler:Zeniba reveals that Haku could only have been saved from her spell by Chihiro's love for him]]. Strangely, this line does not exist in the Japanese version.
* ProductPlacement: Based on the frontal shot of Chihiro's father's car during the opening credits, it would be obvious that it was an Audi even if the four-rings symbol wasn't holding pride of place in the middle of the grille. Lampshaded later when Chihiro asks her father if they are lost and he replies "Don't worry, honey; Daddy's got four-wheel drive!" Whether the car's a 100 or a 200, it's definitely the quattro version.

** Despite being quite unsympathetic as an antagonist, wanting to turn Chihiro's family into pigs and all, Yubaba turns out to be reasonable as well. She makes Chihiro work as hard as the rest of the other workers, who have years of labor behind them, but sees that she has potential. Yubaba senses that the Stink Spirit is something more, and orders Chihiro to clean him as a SecretTestOfCharacter; when Chihiro says he needs help because something is stuck in his side, Yubaba orders all the bathhouse employees to help Chihiro pull out the "thorn" (actually a lot of garbage) from the spirit, cleaning it, unveiling its true form as a river dragon, and leaving them with piles of gold. She then hugs Chihiro and says SoProudOfYou for figuring out what was wrong. At the end, [[spoiler:she agrees with Haku to give Chihiro one last test to earn her parents and freedom back, and honors her word when Chihiro passes with flying colors]].

* RescueRomance: Chihiro and Haku since he is her MysteriousProtector and it's revealed that [[spoiler: he saved Chihiro when she fell into a river as a child]].

* RunningGag: Chihiro keeps getting [[AmusingInjuries knocked on the head.]]

* {{Shapeshifting}}: [[spoiler:Haku, a dragon,]] can transform into a human, and Yubaba into a birdlike creature. [[spoiler:Zeniba turns Boh into a mouse]]. Also, in the Japanese version, it is explicitly stated that ''every worker'' in the bathhouse is a transformed animal spirit.

* SpiritedYoungLady: Like some of Miyazaki’s other female protagonists, Chihiro is a modern version of this trope. Outwardly, she is everything a well-brought-up girl should be, but she is not exactly poised or well-mannered. She is understandably upset when she and her parents have to move to Tochinoki, is supposedly traumatized by her mom and dad turning into pigs, has to be a virtual slave to a powerful witch and has to fight for her life in a dangerous and unfamiliar world of magic. When Haku is being attacked by Zeniba’s paper airplanes, she loses all her "spoiled little rich girl" qualities and battles against all of the odds to save his life.

* WhatIsThisThingYouCallLove

* YouAreACreditToYourRace: Yubaba doesn't like humans at ''all,'' and at their first meeting she shows tremendous contempt for Chihiro. However, by the time Chihiro has proven herself several times over and ''insists'' on facing Yubaba's challenge fair and square, the old ogress admits her uppity servant has courage and determination.

* CainAndAbel: Yubaba and Zeniba. Though the two of them look exactly alike, Yubaba is a manipulative, almost heartless overseer whose main concern (besides her son) are making as much money as possible. Zeniba, meanwhile, has a peaceful life in the forest and is nothing but friendly to Chihiro and the others.

* AdultFear:
** Despite being a young girl. Losing your parents and having to rescue them? Your best friend almost bleeding to death and having to save his life? Chihiro deals with some pretty grown-up situations while maturing as a person.
** The moment where Chihiro gets trapped in the spirit world with her family having changed into pigs. She runs through the food stalls in a strange place, desperately calling for her parents. It's disturbingly familiar to anyone who got lost as a kid.
** The baby's disappearance. You think everything is fine, and then you realize your child is missing. Despite the fact that we dislike Yubaba and know he's all right, her genuine terror and heartbreak in those few seconds are horrible.

** Chihiro restores her parents to human form and returns to the real world, but it's implied that memories of the spirit world promptly leave her mind afterward, and she won't be able to see Haku again.
** Once implied by Miyazaki that Chihiro and Haku wouldn't meet again until her death.

* TheGreatestStoryNeverTold: After Chihiro's parents are turned back into humans, they have absolutely no recollection of what happened and thus have no idea what their daughter went through in order to save them. Chihiro is the only one (in human world, at least) who knows the truth and we may safely assume that nobody is going to believe her.

* WhamShot: Chihiro's parents turning away from their SchmuckBanquet to reveal [[BalefulPolymorph they've been turned into pigs]]. It's at this point both Chihiro and the audience realize things have turned FromBadToWorse.

->''"Once you meet someone, you never really forget them; it just takes a while for your memories to return."''

Chihiro Ogino (Rumi Hiiragi), a sullen young girl unwillingly moving to a new town, is stranded in the spirit world after her parents Akio (Takeshi Naito) and Yuko (Yasuko Sawaguchi) stop by what appears to be an abandoned amusement park and eat food that turns them into pigs. At first, her only aid is Haku (Creator/MiyuIrino), a mysterious boy who finds her shelter and a job in a bathhouse that caters to these spirits. Eventually, Chihiro makes more friends as she searches for a way to make her parents human again and escape the spirit world before she forgets her real identity. And that's all within just the first thirty-minutes of the movie--which doesn't even begin to scratch the surface of the odd denizens of the spirit world, ranging from the villainous bathhouse manager Yubaba (Mari Natsuki) to arachnid worker Kamajii (Bunta Sugawara) to the enigmatic, near-voiceless spirit No Face (Akio Nakamura).

The fact that it won [[UsefulNotes/AcademyAward the Oscar]] for Best Animated Feature Film (the only traditionally-animated film ''and'' the only anime film to do so to date) should be noted as the Oscars tend to favor computer-animated American productions.

''Spirited Away'' was originally released on July 20, 2001 in Japan, and an English dub produced by Disney was released in the United States the following year.

* AfterlifeExpress: The train that Chihiro takes to get to Zeniba's home is intended for use by the dead moving onto the next life, and has phantom passengers.
* AlwaysIdenticalTwins: Yubaba and her twin sister Zeniba look exactly alike despite being the story's closest things to a BigBad and BigGood respectively.
* AmbiguouslyHuman: Some of the spirits have a human like appearance to them, with some such as Lin and Haku, looking nigh distinguishable from normal humans. However, even the more human-like spirits have traits and attributes, subtle or otherwise, that make it clear that they're not really human.

** Zeniba turns Boh and Yubaba's servant into a mouse and a tiny bird, respectively. When Chihiro later asks her to change them back, she says that the spell has worn off, and they can change back any time they want. (They don't choose to until later.)

** Chihiro's parents have ravenous appetites, especially her father. They are (appropriately) transformed into pigs to represent their gluttony.

* BlushSticker: Chihiro has them throughout the entire film.

%%** The blurred line between good and evil.

* TheDissenterIsAlwaysRight: Chihiro and her parents come across an abandoned amusement park. They come across a spread of freshly-made food and the parents start digging in. Chihiro says they shouldn't because they might get in trouble, but they don't pay her any mind and continue eating. [[KarmicTransformation This turns them into pigs]] because the food was meant for spirits.

* EnigmaticMinion: Haku is bound to Yubaba's service, but helps Chihiro whenever no one else is around to see.

* EvilTwin: Played with in the case of Yubaba and Zeniba. Zeniba claims that the two of them are opposites in every way. Zeniba ''did'' lay a curse on the seal Haku stole and threatens Chihiro to stay quiet, but she ultimately is a kind old woman compared to her much greedier twin.

* GenericCuteness: Chihiro was designed specifically to ''avoid'' this trope. Hayao Miyazaki has complained about how a plain or unattractive male character can still be the star but female characters all have to be cute to be the protagonist.

* GettingEatenIsHarmless: No Face, after Chihiro feeds him the river spirit's medicine, throws up everyone he ate. They are all none the worse for the experience.

* TheGreatestStoryNeverTold: After Chihiro's parents are turned back into humans, they have absolutely no recollection of what happened and thus no idea what their daughter went through in order to save them. Chihiro is the only one (in human world, at least) who knows the truth and we may safely assume that nobody is going to believe her.

** [[spoiler:The silent spirit No Face is shunned by everyone else except for Chihiro who treats him with kindness. He later begins swallowing up spirits, which bloats him into a disgustingly obese, multi-limbed creature. Only medicine from Chihiro appeases him.]]

** One of the most notable examples is the very end of the film, where in the English dub we hear Chihiro commenting on how a new school doesn't seem that scary any more. The Japanese original simply has the family drive off in silence, leaving us to wonder how much of her time in the spirit world Chihiro has retained - a much more subtle and ineffable ending.

** Yubaba's son Boh, who seems to be the only thing she cares about more than making money. When he goes missing, she goes full MamaBear on Haku, complete with breath of fire.
** Chihiro is also this herself, to a number of characters. She brings out the best in grouchy Lin, Haku, and Kamaji, and is the only one who cares for No-Face properly.

A 2022 ScreenToStageAdaptation is set to premiere in Tokyo, under the direction of English stage director John Caird. It will be the ''third'' Ghibli film to receive a stage adaptation, following ''Anime/KikisDeliveryService'' and ''Anime/PrincessMononoke''.

* SmallParentHugeChild: Yubaba's son Boh is a massive baby twice the height of his mother. It's implied that he's actually an adult who resembles a baby due to his mother continuing to coddle him into adulthood.

* YearOutsideHourInside: While the audience is never given an exact time scale for how long Chihiro was in the spirit world, the trope is heavily implied: when she returns to the living world, the car is dusty and the foliage around it has grown some. The car does start without a problem, however, so it can't have been more than a few days.

* GrayAndGrayMorality: One of the main themes of this movie is ''the blurred line between good and evil''. People who seem good has flaws but even Yubaba, the closest thing the film has to a villain, is just trying to seem fair and dearly loves her son, Boh.

* DisproportionateRetribution: Chihiro's parents eat food that has been left out in the open in unattended booths and are fully willing to pay for it if an owner appears. So naturally they deserve to be turned into pigs, right? (Of course, Humans might consider it Disproportionate Retribution, but seeing as this is a common theme in stories among [[TheFairFolk fairies and spirits]], such beings [[BlueAndOrangeMorality apparently do not.]])

* CaptainObvious: Chihiro says a few obvious things in the Japanese version. The English dub added several more examples, albeit some ("It's a bathhouse," for example) were added for clarity for a non-Japanese audience.

Chihiro Ogino (Creator/RumiHiiragi), a sullen young girl unwillingly moving to a new town, is stranded in the spirit world after her parents Akio (Creator/TakeshiNaito) and Yuko (Creator/YasukoSawaguchi) stop by what appears to be an abandoned amusement park and eat food that turns them into pigs. At first, her only aid is Haku (Creator/MiyuIrino), a mysterious boy who finds her shelter and a job in a bathhouse that caters to these spirits. Eventually, Chihiro makes more friends as she searches for a way to make her parents human again and escape the spirit world before she forgets her real identity. And that's all within just the first thirty-minutes of the movie--which doesn't even begin to scratch the surface of the odd denizens of the spirit world, ranging from the villainous bathhouse manager Yubaba (Creator/MariNatsuki) to arachnid worker Kamajii (Creator/BuntaSugawara) to the enigmatic, near-voiceless spirit No Face (Creator/AkioNakamura).

The film also stars Creator/TsunehikoKamijo as Chichiyaku and Creator/TakehikoOno as the Aniyaku.