Perfect Blue is a 1997 psychological thriller/mystery movie which is directed by Satoshi Kon (IMDb, n.d.) The movie shows the concept of confusing reality and imagination. The main character Mima is a successful popstar. She loves her profession, but her life begins to change after she decides to become an actress.
In the beginning, Mima explains her decision about being an actress to her fans. People love popstar Mima, and they don’t want her to be an actress. But her agency plans a new image for Mima as an actress.
Changing her profession causes stress for Mima and her manager Rumi because Rumi loves the popstar image of Mima. When Mima tries to adjust to her new acting career, the things that are wanted from Mima begin to increase. Mima has gratitude for her agency and Rumi; because of this, she is starting to gradually lower her boundaries.
What is written about her online, the feeling of being constantly watched, and the fact that she has almost no safe space of her own are beginning to take a psychological toll on her as well. This psychological condition causes Mima to begin blurring the line between reality and fantasy. She tries to continue acting and taking small roles in dramas, but creating a new image comes with questions.
Does Mima really want to be an actress? Or is she trying to just impress people and prove herself? Mima loves her career and has big dreams about herself.
She came to Tokyo for all the lessons and hopes of becoming a popstar. Because of the acting path, she wanted to be trusted and believed. Mima seems to have a conflict between her real self and being an ideal.
Also, her stalker Me-Mania begins to threaten Mima’s safety after she leaves her group Cham. Because in his imagination, Mima is a perfect, innocent popstar, and this acting path is not for her. As time goes by, Mima’s popstar character begins to appear increasingly and tell actress Mima about her regrets.
When Mima starts accepting things she doesn't want, popstar Mima comes and triggers actress Mima’s inner thoughts. Intense stress, trauma, and pressure affect her psychological condition, and the line between imagination and reality becomes unclear. She even begins to not recognize her room because it changes between popstar Mima’s room and actress Mima’s room.
She realizes she has woken up on set time and again. She starts to see more reflections. This shows how all the stress and psychological pressure affect Mima’s reality and make the audience confused like Mima.
Unexpectedly, Rumi also enters the picture. Rumi deeply internalizes the image that Mima wants to escape. Rumi increasingly tries to put herself in Mima's place and believes that she is a popstar and Mima wants to steal her place.
This thought becomes a reality for Rumi. Rumi and Mima may be described as opposite sides. Because Mima wants to change her path and get rid of her popstar self, but Rumi feels connected to this popstar self and wants to become one.
This shows that popstar Mima is a core identity for both of them; however, while Rumi wants to get closer to this identity, Mima wants to move away from it. In conclusion, Perfect Blue is not just a stalker and popstar story; this is also about identity confusion, pressure that causes stress, boundary violation, and self-image problems. Mima may be a good reflection of the uncertainty about choosing the path that aligns with your character or meeting the demands of society.
In short, Mima’s career path changed, and this pressure created an identity conflict for Mima. This identity conflict created confusion between reality and imagination in the movie. The director offers a different perspective on this.
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- IMDb. (n.d.). Perfect Blue. IMDb. https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0156887/