The first thing that struck me when I first heard of Paprika was the setting by which the plot evolved. It had dreams, consciousness and what defines reality as the basis for its story. I thought that most of these questions had been explored to exhaustion by many other anime and that this was going to be another one of many. I couldn't be more wrong.
I'll start from bottom to top. The soundtrack, praise to Susumu Hirasawa, stands on its own as a remarkable composition of music, unique in style and very well placed in the anime. It is very unusual, most of the instruments it uses you won't be recognizing and does well with voice distortion making it an enjoyable out of ordinary experience.
Well drawn, Paprika relies heavily on the visuals of the movie. The dialogues aren't very well executed and often are kept simple and direct, leaving the subtleties of philosophical questions, to the drawing and animations.
Every frame inside the realm of dreams (which you will keep questioning yourself whether it is or not) is well thought, and generally, every small object is full of symbolism. It is well polished, colourful, varied and will make it for a good experience as well.
After I praised the two strongest characteristics of Paprika, lets delve into the other equally important aspects, story line and character development.
As mentioned earlier, Paprika starts with a great premise: a device that allows whoever who uses it, to connect and explore the subconscious and dreams of other people. The movie starts when it is found out that someone outside the scientific research team has access to one of the devices. It then introduces different characters amongst which is the alter ego of the woman protagonist, Paprika which tries to find out whom it is. A psychological police trial, one could say.
The story is fast paced and doesn't leave any holes in it. However at the end, it may leave on you a feeling that more could of been done and that the ending was somewhat rushed.
Summing up, Paprika was a good surprise in many aspects, it could of been better, but stands amongst the crowd of many by trying to do something different. Recommended.
