Spirited Away

While watching the film “Spirited Away” I noticed how many of the workings in the bathhouse relate to topics like consumerism and capitalism. Chihiro is a little girl who goes out of her way to obtain a job working to save her parents from their own consumerism. Looking at the inner workings of the bathhouse, workers are rewarded with these tags which help them to gain more water for the clients own spa treatments. There is a clear hierarchy in the bathhouse- even between the workers themselves where they sleep in crowded areas while Yubaba gets her own suite at the top floor. When Chihiro first starts, she is regarded as filth because she is a human. After a highly successful job with the river spirit, she is rewarded with this moss ball type thing and Yubaba begins to see her as a valuable asset to the bathhouse. This is seen again when No-Face visits and Yubaba wants to manipulate Chihiro to squeeze as much gold out of him as possible. In relation to the topics discussed, Yubaba can be seen as a capitalist that uses her workers to gain money for herself while No-Face is a hardcore consumer, going out of his way to eat as much as possible, and becoming more monsterous the more he consumes.