I really have to say I hated this film

Same here. I loved the animation style of this film but thats about it.

What about the forests?...... NOPE!

One of my top 10 of the 21st century. Not only did I find it intelligent, thought-provoking, and beautiful, but also strangely moving. To say nothing about the music. A genuine masterpiece.

Don't lend your hand to raise no flag atop no ship of fools.

First of all, I have watched the movie some months ago, so please excuse some inaccuracies in my review and that i forgot the names.

I am a novice when it comes to Anime. Over the last few years I've come to appreciate many more thoughtful and subtle movies, and I really do my best to see something in movies. I like to be challenged and rack my brains. Paprika initially started out promising, I followed a police detective and a futuristic dream-therapist unravelling a mysterious murder case involving a high-tech dreaming device, while battling their own personal issues. Many things seemed to make sense. That wonderful scene where the girl jumped the railing. The visuals were stunning. It had me hooked and intrigued.

But in the second half, every bit of internal logic they had established earlier came apart, and it just went overboard. At that point I was starkly disappointed, I lost interest and had to struggle to watch it till the end. Surrealism is fine, but if a movie painstakingly builds a world, sets up a genre and I immerse in it, I just think it's negligent and rude towards the audience to just *beep* it all over. I would've been fine if it just ended with the detective and Paprika solving the case and saving the world. They could've done a neat genre movie and still have all the underlying questions and themes. Instead they decided to transform it into a piece of esoteric modern art, a chaotic crescendo that ultimately went nowhere. I don't like to be spoonfed meaning, but if a director wants people to understand his vision, he should indulge his audience a little. I don't know, I think you can make a meaningful work of art AND keep the viewer entertained at the same time. Paprika, for me, failed at this. It was interesting, but it left me with no intention of ever seeing it again.

Also the pacing was poorly done. Whenever it built up some momentum, they would throw in a few utterly sluggish or repetitive scenes.

I also had a hard time to attach any emotion to the characters. The policeman was the most fleshed out, had clear motivation and thus I rooted for him. But then the focus of the story shifted away for him, and towards a plethora of lifeless, artificial characters, like the fat scientist, who just didn't seem in any way relatable or human for that matter. Just a weird, overdone anime stereotype. I also couldn't care less for the villain. His personality and motivations were never really established, just hinted at(the same thing goes for his sidekick. Like who was that guy?) and he came out of nowhere.