This interview with the late Satoshi Kon is part of the bonus content on the PERFECT BLUE Blu-Ray released in 1st of July. There are three parts, each of them discusses a different part of the movie. I bought the German Blu-Ray and translated the German subtitles of the first part so please forgive my spelling mistakes and awkward phrasing.



I cannot post the video but I will (probably) translate parts 2 and 3 in the following weeks.

Obviously there are many spoilers and I strongly recommend watching the movie first.



[white writings on a blue background introduce the special, Kon starts speaking]

Kon: Good evening, I am Satoshi Kon, the director. „Perfect Blue“ is a twisted movie. I will tell you something about the image tricks of this movie. However, keep in mind that this is always just my own opinion and not the only right „solution“. In the first episode we will take a closer look at Kirigoe Mima’s everyday life and her transformation from an idol to an actress.

Nagai: Good evening to the Perfect Blue lecture. On the next three evenings the director Satoshi Kon will tell us a bit about the mechanisms of his movie Perfect Blue that you probably won’t notice on your first viewing.

Kon: Thank you very much for the invitation.

Nagai: Thank you.

Kon: I am Satoshi Kon, director of Perfect Blue. Almost 10 years have passed since I made Perfect Blue. Back then when Perfect Blue was released Susumu Hirasawa’s album “Kyosai no Giho” was released at the same time.

[Kon holds the promotional flyer into the camera]

Kon: Later he composed the music for my movie “Millennium Actress”, the series “Paranoia Agent” as well as “Paprika” which was released last year. “Kyosai no Giho” was his 7th album. This is a promotional flyer for it. I was allowed to write a “advertising quote”. Additionally there are quotes by Kentaro Miura, the Berserk guy, Yuko “Miyamu” Miyamura and Ryoko Yamagishi. And here is mine. [points at quote on flyer] Kentaro Miura is described as “Mangaka”, Yuko Miyamura as “Seiyuu/voice actor”. Ryoko Yamagishi as “Mangaka”. Just mine says “director of Perfect Blue”. [laughs]

Yes… My profession is also “Director of Perfect Blue”. A very narrow field of work. I am a true specialist as you can see. [audience and Nagai laugh]

In this lecture I will be in my element.

Nagai: I am Runa Nagai, I will assist our lecturer. So this is the first “Perfect Blue” lecture!

Nagai: Our first topic is the scene where next to a superhero show in an amusement park fans of the pop group Cham exchange the newest rumours about their idols.

Kon: Yes. The first scene is very important in every movie. If it is boring the interest of the audience wont be piqued, they will not be captivated. One thinks a lot about the first scene as a director. On top of this it was my first directing role and because of this I really thought a lot about this. Well… First… I have already suggested it: It is a psychothriller. Already while working on the movie we assumed that the finished movie will probably be labeled as a “Anime-Psychothriller”.

That might not have been my intention behind creating it but movies are often affixed with a label.

So during production it was not my intention to create a psychothriller but I knew that it would be labelled as such. I made it as an OVA (Original Video Anime).

[Note: Anime that are released on DVD first and in some cases later shown on TV or in cinemas are called OVA in Japan. Often anime with questionable content or a very narrow target audience are released as such.]

What do people usually do when they borrow an anime movie? It is weekend, they go to the video store, think “this one will probably be a bit creepy, looks pretty realistic” and borrow it, right? Then they walk home, start watching the movie and then there is this scene. They think it is the wrong movie!

Nagai: I thought that it was the wrong movie, too!

Kon: See?

Nagai: A sentai movie!

[Note: The German subtitles translated this as superhero movie. While this is not wrong, a sentai or super sentai show focuses characters who form a group to fight evil.]

Kon: That is good! Exactly the right reaction.

Nagai: I thought so until a certain point.

Kon: Exactly this deception was what I had in mind with this scene. “Is this a children’s movie?” Well, it is one after all. A movie for the big children called men. Right? It is such a movie. Well, this was also an intention but at the same time… There are humans in there. In reality. [points at characters in sentai suits] And they wear masks.

Nagai: Ahh… a mask. [laughs]

Kon: They are disguised.

Nagai: Disguised.

Kon: Yes, diguised.

Nagai: And this correlates to the following story.

Kon: [raises stick] That’s right! You have a exceptionally keen perception indeed.

Nagai: [blushes and laughs]

Kon: At the opening of this movie… Well, actually this is the case with all the other works, too… For example an essay. You are slightly confused right now, aren’t you?

Nagai: [laughs] Yes.

Kon: When you write an essay you write the introduction first.

Nagai: An intro.

Kon: Yes, an intro.

Kon: “I will write about this topic.” That’s what you write first. And this scene is exactly that. “Now a story about masks is about to begin.” [shakes stick] Masks.

Nagai: Did you want the viewers to notice this or was it enough if only you knew it? If only you, the director, understood it? Because I did not notice it.

Kon: [raises stick] And that is fine. This is important for the people who make the movie, important for the attitude they start their work with. For the audience it is enough if they notice it on their second viewing.

Another term for mask is “Persona”. Do you know that term?

Nagai: It can also mean “role”, right? The role that you play yourself.

Kon: Yes. Originally it is Latin for “mask”. And the English “person” or “personality”, also p-e-r… [looks into folder in his hands] …s-o-n, these terms also come from “Persona”. It is their word root. Well… So the word encompasses both the meaning “mask” as well as the person who is wearing said mask. In other words: The movie “Perfect Blue” is about humans who wear “Personae”. We put this cumbersome, complicated meaning into this image that originally targets children.

…well, this does not make a lot of sense. [laughs] But that is what I thought of when creating this image. So to speak this was my personal approach that I included here. And these three [referring to the three heroes on screen] are “RGB” by the way. [points at heroes with the stick] Red – Green-Blue. RGB. “Powertron”, that’s what I called them. And this here is their [start movie on screen via remote control] Special Attack! [screen shows heroes shooting at villain] And this guy here that they attack [pauses movie at close-up of villain] that is King Bug. That’s what I called him.

Nagai: Yes.

Kon: The “Bug” in “King Bug” [pronounced King Bug] comes from “bug” obviously. It means “King of Bugs” [pronounced Bug no Ōsama] . The Powertrons RGB fight for the preservation of peace and order in the system. A bug, meaning the King of Bugs [pronounced Bug no Ōsama], appears and confounds the order in the network. And the main character of the movie, who is talked about in media, she is afflicted by a bug, an evil fan, a crazy fan, too. In her character, her humanity more and more bugs appear. This is the meaning of this scene. But one cannot know that.

Nagai: That’s right.

Kon: But with this background information one can answer everything at work. Invariably the director is asked a lot. When the co-workers ask one, “What does this mean?”, there are always difficulcies, especially when you do something complicated. Then you have to say: “It means this and this.” But I always feel like a stargazer who tells the people nonsense. But actually at work I always came up with something like this.

Nagai: So there is an intention in every scene?

Kon: [raises stick] Exactly!



Nagai: There are no scenes without such an intention behind them?

Kon: Well, in animated movies there is nothing that was not drawn. In real movies you also shoot unplanned things. Of course you have a plan. But still, the shape of clouds cannot be changed regardless for example. In animated movies everything is planned. What is not planned is not included. Of course there are bad pictures. Unwanted mistakes. But overall everything has to be planned. You cannot draw something without a plan.

Nagai: When you draw manga, do you plan every scene this accurately?

Kon: Well… At the very beginning I sometimes just started drawing. But after some works I noticed that you should better have a plan for everything. This way it happened less and less often that I drew carelessly.





If you have any questions or corrections please let me know.

