Paprika

A revolutionary dream imaging machine allows Dr Chiba to help those troubled by nightmares. When the device is stolen, patients have difficulty discerning fiction from reality. Ultimately, the dream world crosses over into real life. Dr Chiba, Detective Toshimi, and Dr Tokita try to track down whoever is misusing this ground-breaking device.

Paprika is an absolutely magnificent film from beginning to end. Every scene is a rich, visual treat. Even if this were a film with no plot, it would be worth staring in wonder at the dream sequences. They're beautiful and create an engaging fantasy world. With the strong plot to back them up, it makes for a film to watch and love again and again.

Paprika is exactly what anime films should be. It couldn't be made as a live action film, but it still has enough depth of character and plot so that the audience is drawn into its world. It has an astonishing array of grand scenes that could only be drawn rather than filmed, but they're never showy for the sake of being showy. Everything is fully appropriate, and couldn't be done any other way or any better.

There's nothing at all to fault in Paprika. It's thrilling, enjoyable, intriguing, engaging, and stimulating. The voice acting is great (both in Japanese and in the English dub). Satoshi Kon has created a perfect piece of cinema, based on Yasutaka Tsutsui's novel. The title sequence is beautiful, the theme music is catchy, everything is stunning. I could just list everything in the film and bleed my thesaurus dry of superlatives. It boils down to one thing and one thing only: you should watch Paprika.