Before we get into Jiufen and Spirited Away, though, let’s look at the history of this little Taiwanese town. It has had an interesting one, much of which is actually Japanese related, and will set the table for the comparison between the place and the film later in this article.

A Japanese-ish History

In 1895, Taiwan became Japan’s first colony, so Japan wanted to try to show off to the rest of the world that they could do the whole normally-Western-but-not-this-time imperialism sort of thing. They decided to make Taiwan a “model” colony for all their future colonies, so much effort and money was put into building up Taiwan’s infrastructure, industry, standard of living, and economy. They also made a big effort to change the culture and get everyone speaking Japanese. In fact, to this day elderly Taiwanese people still speak Japanese fluently, as that’s what they grew up speaking. I spent a good amount of time talking to one elderly Taiwanese person (in Japanese) and she was certainly a wealth of “Japanese Era” information… maybe more on that in another post.

Jiufen itself was starting to get popular even a couple of years before Japan appeared. Why? Gold was discovered. If I know anything about gold and the olden days, it’s that people like to “rush” for it. The height of Jiufen’s gold rush occurred during the Japanese occupation when (I imagine) the Japanese got really into mining for gold. Gold helps to fund war-related things, I imagine, and I hear the British POW labor from Singapore sent to work in the mines was top notch. Quite a bit was built up around here, and Japanese ryokans and bath houses exist in the town to this day. I seem to remember Spirited Away having one of those…

Jiufen And Spirited Away

While the story of Jiufen, its gold rush, its POW gold miners, and its rise to tourist popularity has nothing to do with the actual story of Spirited Away, many parts of the film do tear off some huge Jiufen chunks as inspiration for the characters and places that Miyazaki created. Unfortunately, having not seen the film recently, I was relying on some pretty shaky memories, so below are some pictures that I took as well as some pictures others took (these are the ones with a citation). I’ve broken it up into sections too, to help you to see exactly what parts of Jiufen made it into the film. Hopefully someday you can visit this place too and be able to say “hey, wait, that was in Spirited Away!”

Dragons

The dragon Haku was an important part of the film. This much I remembered. While this is true for much of Taiwan and not just Jiufen, there were dragons on top of the temple right when you get off the bus.

This alone is hardly enough to convince anyone that Jiufen was the inspiration for the places in Spirited Away, it’s a start. Let’s move on to something more connecty: FOOOOD.

Food

The spirits in the film ate tons of food (you know that from Fiona’s post about the foods of Spirited Away). The girl’s parents ate tons of food (and turned into delicious pigs). Food was a huge part of the film and Jiufen had plenty of it. Lining the streets were many stalls, and I’d say more than half of them centered around something you could consume. Certainly one of the main attractions of this place is the things that can be devoured.

Suffice to say, the variety and uniqueness of the food could have easily been a small inspiration for Miyazaki in making this film. While I don’t think I saw any of  the more unique Jiufen foods in Spirited Away (or in any pictures of Spirited Away), both places had numerous food stalls, food, and people/spirits eating the food. The vibe of the food stalls and the people eating the food was similar as well. Delicious.

Streets, Stairs, And Red Lanterns

The architecture and street layouts of both Jiufen and Spirited Away are quite unique yet quite similar. Jiufen has the whole Japanese but not Japanese thing going for it, due to the occupation period. Spirited Away has the Japanese but somewhat other-worldy thing going for it due to the other-worldliness of it. Not too far off from each other, I’d say.

Another notable similarity is all the red lanterns. Both Jiufen and Spirited Away are teaming with them. Just the amount you see in both the film and real place is enough to convince me that Miyazaki was here and taking notes. If that’s not enough for you, all you have to do is look at the winding roads and long staircases featured in both places.

Stairs.

And even more stairs.

Jiufen seriously had way too many stairs, but it made for a very unique looking place. I seem to remember stairs being a common occurrence in Spirited Away, as well. Up the stairs down the stairs, stairs in the background, egg and stair, bacon and stair egg, bacon, sausage and stairs with eggs, stairs stairs stairs stairs.

Buildings

The buildings in Spirited Away were incredibly iconic. What stood out the most (because this is where much of the story took place) was the Bath House in which the main character worked. This building was supposedly inspired by the Grand Tea House in Jiufen. While not as magnificent as the anime version, it’s difficult to not see the similarity:

Another thing I noticed were the tunnels all throughout Jiufen. It was a mining community for most of its recent history, so it’s only natural that there be tunnels. One thing that surprised me were the tunnels that you could go through in Jiufen. They’d lead you to new areas of the town, almost magically. One tunnel we went through (pictured below) took us out to a tea house and beautiful view. You don’t expect that kind of thing when you get into small, scary tunnels. Viet certainly wins this “More Meta Than You” photo contest.

The surprise and magic of coming out of a tunnel and into a newish world (in Jiufen) felt really reminiscent of the beginning of Spirited Away when Chihiro and her parents go through the tunnel and into the town. Luckily, on the other side of our tunnel all we had was a tea house, run by ordinary people.

I believe there were other tunnels in the film as well, though someone will have to remind me since it’s been a while. The tunnel up above supposedly has a tunnel in Jiufen that’s more similar to it, but I didn’t find it in my journey. Anyways, Jiufen had tunnels galore, and it rewarded discovery and exploration, making the place feel more magical. When you go through one, who knows where you’ll end up! Dun dun dunnn.

Characters

Of course, Spirited Away was filled with interesting characters… that being said, I couldn’t stop getting the impression as I walked through Jiufen that the real place had just as many odd people/spirits. Usually in Taiwan you don’t see this many odd people gathered all in one place. In Jiufen, these kinds of folks were a dime-a-dozen. This isn’t a bad thing – I think weird is great (where’s my “Keep Jiufen Weird” bumper sticker?) – what’s interesting to me is that there’s potential that some inspiration for Spirited Away could have come from Jiufen. Most people just mention the streets and architecture when making the Spirited Away / Jiufen comparison, but I think I’m onto something here.

Take a look at this guy, for example. He runs a leather shop in the middle of Jiufen, but he’s just in the back rocking out on his electric guitar, never selling any leather. I was the only one who stood there to watch, then clapped a bit at the end. He seemed a bit surprised by that, so I quickly moved on. Anyways, he’s a little bit odd, all things considered. It gets more interesting, though.

Take a look at this guy. He sells and plays (and maybe makes?) ocarinas. Of course, he runs an ocarina store so this makes sense. That being said, his personality and look were pretty unique to me yet a little familiar…

Maybe in twenty or thirty years? Haku does not age well.

Apparently, and you can see them in the background in the ocarina guy’s picture, he has some ocarinas that have a resemblance to No Face in the film. I’ll let you decide on that one, but perhaps this real-life character made a fairly big impact on Miyazaki?

The last guy I’m going to show you was the most direct correlation between the characters of Jiufen and the characters of Spirited Away. I have no clue if he was around when Miyazaki was here, so perhaps I’m just throwing this out there, but do you remember the three heads that rolled around in the movie? These guys right here?

Well, there was a mask exhibit, which was basically a place where this one dude who makes a ton of crazy masks/heads/busts displays his art. They immediately reminded me of this part of the film, just because they were unattached heads like the masks/busts that this guy made. Here he is in all his glory with a bust of… himself making a face. Actually, he made all the faces for us, but I’ll leave the rest to your imagination.

It doesn’t end here. He had three and a half large rooms filled with masks/busts that he had made, usually not of himself. Just about everything looks like something from the mind of a serial killer / psychopath, though the guy himself was super friendly and nice (but aren’t they all?). Take a look at some of his other masks. There were too many for me to take pictures of them all and too many pictures to spam up on this post, so suffice to say there were a lot. I can only imagine the time he put into all of this.

Lots of masks, and lots of sources for possible character inspiration, wouldn’t you say? Whatever happened or didn’t happen here, though, I can easily conclude that this was my favorite part of Jiufen. I really like this sort of thing for some reason… Maybe Miyazaki stopped by to walk through this exhibit as well? Spirited Away was definitely one of Miyazaki’s most unique and interesting films character-wise, I’d say. If he ran across this place, there would have been no shortage of wild inspiration for him to draw from.

Getting To Jiufen

If you want to go to Jiufen, of course you’ll want to first make your way to Taiwan. Once there, go to Zhongxiao Fuxing MRT Station in Taipei and leave Exit 1. You should see Bus #1062 near the corner. Get on that bus, and prepare for a fun ride (remember, left side of the bus = “best” / most terrifying view!). If you get the bus driver that we got, you’re going to have somewhat of a lead foot on the ol’ gas / brake pedal. Oh, and did I mention there are plenty of steep ledges? It will make the food of Jiufen taste all the more better because you’ll feel alive (or you’ll just be dead from rolling bus syndrome).

Besides Jiufen, Taiwan is a great place to visit. It really does feel kind of like Japan in a way. Of course, it’s not anywhere near the same and a unique society and culture exists, but there’s that sort of background, white noise sort of feeling that Japan is subtly there, somewhere, watching you. There is still something remaining from the occupation years and it makes for an interesting mix of people, food, and culture. Definitely pop down to Taiwan sometime if you get the chance!

And lastly, if that wasn’t enough, I found this side-by-side picture comparison of Jiufen/Spirited done by Oh What A Day that I thought was quite good. It’s hard to not see the similarities when you see it presented this way!

Hope you enjoyed this post. Jiufen and Spirited Away certainly have connections, though I don’t know how much is real inspiration and how much is “reading too much into things.” Whatever it was, it was a fun trip and I highly recommend it. You can fly from Japan to Taiwan for fairly cheap, so if you have an extra week or so pop down to see what the fuss is all about. Hit up some night markets while you’re at it.

To be more precise, this is a post about the food depicted in Studio Ghibli films – always mouthwateringly detailed and remarkably true to life. Grave of the Fireflies, for example, featured candies in a rectangular can: they’re Sakuma Drops, still manufactured to this day. Then there was all the fuss about eating a pineapple in Only Yesterday – because at the time, imported fruit was rare and expensive.

Yeah Studio Ghibli food appreciation for the win! How many do you recognize?

Although food is certainly a scene-stealer in so many Studio Ghibli films, in no other film does it play a more important role than in Spirited Away. Think about it: if Chihiro’s parents weren’t such gluttons, they wouldn’t have become pigs and there would have been no story.

The neat thing about Spirited Away is that much of the food shown is typical Japanese fare – and boy, is there a lot of it. This movie makes for perfect Introduction to Japanese Cuisine 101 stuff. So why not?

First the Savories…

Onigiri (おにぎり) are rice balls. They’ve been around since at least the Heian period, and nowadays are easily available from any convenience store. They’re often triangular with a filling of some kind and wrapped in nori seaweed, although there really aren’t any hard and fast rules when it comes to onigiri. They’re also considered comfort food, so it’s no surprise that Haku consoles Chihiro with them after she finds out her parents really were turned into pigs.

Of course, the most food-centric event in Spirited Away must be when the bathhouse workers are falling over themselves to serve No-Face. Check out the following scene:

Can you spot the sushi platter? Sushi (寿司) is another classic Japanese dish, made of vinegared rice and some sort of topping or filling. There are loads of different types of sushi, but the ones shown in the screencap are: nigirizushi, rice topped with prawn or tuna or something; and makizushi, a roll of rice wrapped around whatever fillings you fancy and then sliced to serve.

Next to the sushi platter we have ishi yaki-imo (石焼き芋), or sweet potato slow-roasted on hot stones. This is a typical autumn snack in Japan, sold by peddlers from food carts or small trucks. Apparently you can hear the peddlers coming from miles away thanks to the peculiar singsong announcements they make.

Ikameshi (イカ飯) also turns up in this scene. This is a Hokkaido dish of rice-stuffed squid simmered in soy sauce. Ikameshi was born out of necessity: during WWII squid was plentiful but rice was not, so ikameshi was the ideal way to compensate.

… Then the Sweets

Chihiro’s first encounter with Lin, her soon-to-be ally, was when the latter was feeding the soot sprites konpeito (コンペイトー). These knobbly candies are basically just sugar and coloring, and easily available nowadays. Back when they were first introduced by the Portuguese, though, they were considered really posh. In fact, a Portuguese missionary allegedly bribed Oda Nobunaga for permission to preach Christianity in Japan with a bottle of konpeito.

As a human, Chihiro wasn’t exactly welcomed with open arms by the other bathhouse workers – that is, until she proved herself by successfully bathing the Stink God (who turned out to be the God of Rivers). As a “Hey, you’re all right,” gesture, Lin gives her an anman (あんまん) later that night. This is a steamed bun with a red bean paste filling, originally from China.

The sponge cake, castella (カステラ), also makes an appearance. Once again, this is a foreign dish that the Japanese have adopted and made into their own: like konpeito, castella is also Portuguese in origin. There are lots of variations on it now, like green tea castella and chocolate castella, but the textbook example is still the plain, bright yellow castella with brown edges.

Honorable Mentions

The foods I’ve mentioned so far are just the tip of the iceberg, really. There are many more dishes in Spirited Away that I don’t know (or don’t consider typically Japanese). So I won’t try to describe them all, but here are a few more that I recognize:

At the far left you can just make out green peas rice. This is a type of maze gohan (混ぜご飯), basically just rice mixed with some other ingredient. Another variant is matsutake rice – matsutake mushrooms are damned expensive so mixing it up with rice is one way to make the meal go further.

At the bottom middle there is nishime (煮しめ), a typical New Year’s vegetable stew with carrots, mushrooms and konnyaku, a grey, jelly-type thing with practically no calories and full of fiber. Last but not least, right next to the nishime there is some form of katsu (カツ): a chicken or pork cutlet, breaded and then deep-fried.

There you have it! A whirlwind introduction to various Japanese foods, modern and traditional, sweet and savory, of foreign origin or a Japanese original.

Can you spot any other typical Japanese foods in Spirited Away? Or in any other Studio Ghibli film for that matter? Let us know what they are in the comments!

Over the years Studio Ghibli has won many awards for their whimsical creations and in 2002, Spirited Away won a Golden Bear and an Oscar for Best Animated Feature. To this day it remains the only film made outside of the English-speaking world to have done so. Do you know the secret that makes all of Ghibli so magical? No? Read on to find out.

Ghibli and Friends

So where does the name Ghibli come from anyway? Well, Ghibli is based on the Arabic name for the sirocco (Mediterranean wind). During World War II the Italians used the sirocco for their Saharan scouting planes. Although pronounced with a hard g in both Arabic and Italian, the Japanese pronunciation of the word is with a soft g (ji-bu-ri).

The reason the studio chose to go with this name was because they wanted to “blow a new wind through the Japanese anime industry” changing things up and offering a breath of fresh air – pretty ambitious to say the least. But the studio has certainly lived up to its namesake. Check out this quick list showcasing some of the studio’s top highlights.

• The first real box-office success in Studio Ghibli’s history (just over $18 million) was Kiki’s Delivery Service in 1989, four years after the studio’s creation.
• The highest-grossing film of 1992 in Japan was Studio Ghibli’s very own Porco Rosso (¥2.8 billion in distribution income).
• The first ever Studio Ghibli film to use computer graphics was Pom Poko in 1992, starring a group of tanuki.
• The first Miyazaki film featuring computer graphics, and the first Studio Ghibli film featuring digital coloring was Princess Mononoke in 1997. Roger Ebert placed the movie sixth on his top ten movies of 1999 (after it had been released in the US) and it was also the highest grossing movie in Japan (overtaking E.T.) with $134 million in box office revenue until the achievement was claimed by Titanic several months later (but not for long!)
• The first Studio Ghibli film made entirely with digital processing was My Neighbors the Yamadas in 1999.
• Studio Ghibli’s Spirited Away was the first film to gross $200 million worldwide before opening in North America (eventually making about $275 million in total), and it was the only anime film ever to win an Academy award for Best Animated Feature, and it took over Titanic ($135 million) at the Japanese box office, becoming the top grossing film ever in Japanese cinema.

The achievements above, along with a lot of other information can be found on Studio Ghibli’s Wikipedia page. And for those of you who are unfamiliar with the history behind the origins of Studio Ghibli, a good synopsis can be found here.

What Makes Ghibli Special

So what makes a Studio Ghibli film a Studio Ghibli film? Well, their works most often feature common motifs, themes, and imagery for one. These commonalities include female leads (usually younger), (talking) cats, sweet old ladies, things related to aviation, trains, boutiques, characters with multiple forms and identities, flocks of birds, birdlike creatures, misunderstood male characters, secret or hidden places, and in many cases a lack of a clearly defined antagonist.

These were things I never really thought about much before I actually took the time to look back on the films, but once you realize the commonalities they’re pretty easy to spot. Take Spirited Away for example: its setting is in a secret place, we’ve got a young female lead, a sweet old lady, birdlike creatures, characters with multiple forms and identities, and a misunderstood male character. Studio Ghiblianism at its finest.

But did you know that the “first Studio Ghibli film” isn’t actually a Studio Ghibli film at all? Even though Nausicaä of the Valley of Wind was written and directed by Hayao Miyazaki himself, the film was created one year prior to the creation of Studio Ghibli. Nausicaä was actually published by a studio known as Topcraft. So even though it’s not technically a Studio Ghibli film, it is often credited as one due to how influential it was to the studio’s creation in 1985.

Another fun fact is that Studio Ghibli has adopted a strict “no cuts” policy. This policy was introduced after the unfortunate butchering of the American release of Nausicaä which can be read more about here. The policy was brought up again after the release of Princess Mononoke in 1997 because Miramax wanted to make changes to the film in order to make it more marketable to the United States when it was released over here in 1999. Apparently Studio Ghibli responded by sending Miramax an authentic katana with a simple message reading “no cuts” attached to it. That’s certainly one way to get your point across.

I really respect this about Studio Ghibli. I don’t know about you, but I’ve always hated it when localized films are cut or altered from their original forms by someone other than the actual creator of the film. Knowing that all of Ghibli’s films are now brought to the United States exactly as they were meant to be viewed is a very comforting feeling even if the American production companies insist on having them dubbed into English. But hey, that’s what multi-language DVDs are made for, right? Right.

Studio Ghibli was even nice enough to give a shoutout to Pixar for their 25th anniversary. How kind! Both studios have collaborated with Disney, drawn inspiration from one another, and have even visited each other on various occasions. Both Pixar and Studio Ghibli are argued to be two of the best animation studios in the world today and are right up there with Disney in my opinion.

Upcoming Films

Is that a berry in your pocket or are you just happy to see me?

The next film due to hit the States from Studio Ghibli is The Secret World of Arrietty/The Borrower Arrietty (借りぐらしのアリエッティ). I was lucky enough to get to see Arrietty and it was pretty good. Princess Mononoke and Spirited Away are definitely still my favorites from the studio however, but Arrietty was pretty solid as well.

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If the song at the end of the trailer sounds familiar, it’s probably because you heard it from the Imaginary Flying Machines album I posted about a while back. If you haven’t checked it out yet, you really should. It rocks.

Studio Ghibli’s From up on Poppy Hill (コクリコ坂から) came out in Japan earlier this year, (trailer can be found here) and The Tale of the Bamboo Cutter is currently in the works.

The Studio Ghibli Museum

The Totoro went thataway!

Did you know that Studio Ghibli also has its very own museum? Well they do, and from the looks of it, it’s a pretty cool place to be. Located in Mitaka, Tokyo, the museum promises to make all of your Studio Ghibli dreams come true. Unfortunately I haven’t actually been there myself, but you can read all about it over here.

Have you been to the Ghibli Museum before? Tell us about how cool it is in the comments!

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So tell me – what’s your favorite Studio Ghibli film of all time?

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