Perfect Blue is the Directorial film debut of the late Satoshi Kon and the film that rightfully put him on the map. It is a psychological thriller about idolturnedactress Mima Kirigoe also known as Mimarin following her descent into paranoia as the stress of an image change and a series of stalkings and murders slowly cause her to become disconnected from reality. The film shows its strengths as early as the opening moments where it juxtaposes scenes of Mima performing with the idol group CHAM and scenes of Mima living life as an ordinary girl switching between the two with match cuts. Its able to immediately establish two things Kon has been known for: his topnotch editing style and his focus on blurring the line between perception versus reality. In Perfect Blue the perception versus reality takes the form of the person versus the persona the actor versus the character the world versus the stage. The plot of Perfect Blue kicks off when Mima quits CHAM to pursue opportunities in acting quickly taking on a strong supporting role in the television crime drama Double Bind. However the Double Bind role sees her playing a darker more sexually involved character and Mimas fans from her idol days arent happy with her change from the more pure and innocent role she played as a pop idol. Among these disgruntled fans is a stalker known only by his screen name MeMania. Mima starts to become troubled as she encounters him more and more frequently and when threats and murders start to plague the people around Mima who are forcing her into more explicit roles Mima begins breaking down seeing a ghostly reflection of her self dressed in her CHAM stage outfit who taunts her and claims to be the real Mima. What follows is a wild ride of not knowing what the hell is actually happening and whats all just part of the play so to speak. This is where the story really begins to pick up but unfortunately describing it in more detail is both difficult due to the structure of the film and would also completely spoil the experience. I ask that you just trust me on this and subject yourself to Satoshi Kons Wild Ride. Perfect Blues strength really shines in the visuals and editing. There is of course the aforementioned match cuts in the opening showing that even pop idols live fairly normal lives. Theres the constant reflection motifs which emphasize that perceived identities despite how much importance we place on them are mere imitations of the true self. Theres the constant abrupt cuts that disorient the audience and Mima and force them to question how much of what they just saw was real and how much was imagined. And then theres the fact that its filled with just flatout good visuals. In fact Perfect Blue is so strong on this front that several western films have paid it direct homage such as Black Swan lifting several themes and crafting similar visuals or Requiem for a Dream flatout recreating the bathtub scream scenehttps://www..com/watch?v=vt0ulBpi2zA. This extends from the opening scene as has already been mentioned to the final line where light spoiler Perfect Blue is overall just very wellcrafted. Its one of those films that you can watch again and again and gain something new from each time which in my opinion is the mark of a great film. However I understand that there are a few flaws and while in my opinion theyre excusable and arguably necessary I can see how others may disagree. First of all it pulls no punches in the depiction of otaku and idol fans in particular. In a film filled with subtlety these idol fans MeMania in particular come across as gross caricatures or plot devices rather than actual characters. The other major issue people may have with the film is that it cheats. When the film begins to mess with the audiences perception of whats happening it is not above outright lying or changing facts to cause viewers to question whats real. While this does reflect Mimas deteriorating mental state it can feel a bit unfair and on repeated viewings its easy to look at certain scenes and say okay well this is just outright trying to mislead me. I cant give it a perfect score out of 100 because of that but since all media is inherently subjective I think this is the closest I can possibly get. Despite those minor flaws I still think that Perfect Blue is a film thats about as well perfect as you can get. If youre even remotely interested in postmodern works that lean on the fourth wall themes that delve into identity or just the thriller genre in general Perfect Blue is a film I think youll absolutely love. I give the film the highest of recommendations. 5 Stars.