Movies: High Spirits

Japan offers the year's most enthralling cartoon feature

Most movies are the crudest of transportation devices: clown cars for idiot laughter, stock cars of bloody revenge. Not often does a film truly transport viewers outside themselves--or deep inside. One such precious vehicle is Hayao Miyazaki's Spirited Away, which has shown its class and mass appeal by winning the top prize at this year's Berlin Film Festival and by becoming, in the first 25 days of its release, the all-time top box-office hit in its native Japan. Now this delectable treat from the world's most revered master of animation (My Neighbor Totoro, Princess Mononoke) is ready to dazzle American audiences...

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