Perfect Blue represents the next wave of Japanimation. The producers of the MIFF 1996 animation sensation Memories have pushed the limits of visual expression. Perfect Blue balances Japanese suspense and action with probing characters. Based on a novel by Yoshikazu Takeuchi, the central character, Mima Kirirgoe, is the lead singer of a pop group who is losing sight of her real goals and becomes depressed. While working on her role as an anti-heroine in a TV drama series, she begins to suspect that she is being followed. Various inexplicable events take place and Mima realises there is a virtual Mima out there impersonating her. Mima confronts not only her stalker but her own identity as a media-hyped illusion.

Director Satoshi Kon has taken Sadayuki Murai's screenplay to a new creative level, employing psychological figure drawing and bold angles to capture mood and tension. In the process the traditional Japanimation themes of science fiction and myth become curiously archaic, if not redundant. Perfect Blue is visually seamless - so much so that the narrative becomes thoroughly engrossing and the technology transparent. Visual-cinematic treats such as Perlect Blue are few and far between, a Feslival highlight that is not to be missed.

Satoshi Kon trained as a comic writer while studying at the Musashino College of Fine Arts. In 1990 he published the comic book Kaikisen, and the next year was in charge of the layout for Hashire Meros, a feature-length animated film. Satoshi Kon has also worked on the screenplay and background design for Magnetic Rose, the first segment of Memories (MIFF 1996). Perfect Blue is his first film as director.