A machine allows therapists to enter patients' dreams. When it's stolen, all hell breaks loose, and only a woman therapist (nicknamed "Paprika") seems able to stop it. - skip ad - Genres: Art/Foreign, Science Fiction/Fantasy, Thriller, Animation and Adaptation Running Time: 1 hr. 30 min. Release Date: May 25th, 2007 MPAA Rating: R for violent and sexual images. Distributor: Sony Pictures Releasing International, Sony Pictures Classics Cast And Credits Starring: Megumi Hayashibara, Toru Emori, Katsunosuke Hori, Toru Furuya, Akio Otsuka Directed by: Satoshi Kon Produced by: Jungo Maruta, Masao Takiyama

After the outre charms of "Tokyo Godfathers," director Satoshi Kon returns to a more conventional anime theme for "Paprika." Based on a serialized novel by Yasutaka Tsutsui, the film explores a conflict between technology and humanity by taking viewers inside the muddled dreams of its protagonists. It is an intelligently written piece that only falters during the finale, where Kon sacrifices the film's logic for an explosive ending.

"Paprika" plays well enough on the big screen, but it probably will do most business on DVD. Visuals often are imaginative but not startling enough to break the ingrained resistance non-Japanese adults feel toward animation. Kudos to the New York Film Festival for presenting this animation on par with its live-action art house dramas. Triumph and Destination Films will release the film in North America in March.

The story centers on a prototype gadget called a DC-MINI, which allows psychologists to enter into their patients' dreams. An unknown villain steals the DC-MINI and uses it to enter people's minds and control them. Dreams start to invade waking time as subconscious moments become confused with conscious ones. Chiba, a young female psychologist on the DC-MINI team, takes on a subconscious alter ego -- named Paprika -- and dives into the dream world to root out the culprit.

ThThis story of useful technology being used in a detrimental way has similarities with the seminal A.I. drama "Ghost in the Shell," which confronted the possibility that robots could become conscious. "Paprika" isn't as fully formed as that film -- its villain is a crude rendition -- but some interesting points are raised along the way. These include an altercation between Chiba and her subconscious alter ego about who really controls whom.

The narrative involves visiting different dreamscapes, and the visual potential of this is exploited well. Some dreams are Miyazaki-like fantasies; others are crazy carnivals. The ending, which replicates the doomed cityscapes that have characterized Japanese sci-fi since "Godzilla," is thunderous, but it doesn't jell with the rest of the film's careful exposition.