The girl of your dreams -- and his dreams and her dreams -- the punkish heroine of Satoshi Kon's Paprika, is a double-agent-provocateur in a shape-shifting movie of marvelous, baffling complexities.
It's a long way from the work of that Japanese Walt Disney, Hayao Miyazaki (Spirited Away). And it is also anime decidedly for adults: Among Paprika's thriller aspects, noirish angst and futuristic action, nothing is ever what it appears. Dreams intrude on dreams. Surfaces of reality fold over each other, like the petals on an origami chrysanthemum.
Paprika (Sony Pictures Classics) Starring the voices of Megumi Hayashibara, Toru Furuya. Directed by Satoshi Kon. Rated R. Time 90 minutes.
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See more photos from this film at baltimoresun.com/paprika