ICYMI: The Joys of Being in Perfect Days
When it comes to the greats of New German Cinema, I’ll readily admit that I’ve always been most drawn to the man vs. nature epics of Herzog, and the sly social satire of Fassbinder. Of course I don’t mean to say that I’ve neglected or am a detractor of Wim Wenders by any means. To the contrary, I’ve enjoyed much of his work to varying degrees, but it was not until 2023’s Perfect Days that one of his projects has truly stood out and resonated with me this deeply. This summer I was lucky enough to have the chance to go to Tokyo, truly one of the great cities of humanity, and it was an experience I won’t soon forget. Watching Perfect Days, I was instantly reminded of the beauty and majesty of this magnificent metropolis. Kōji Yakusho’s quiet, tender performance as Hirayama is likely the best acting of the year, but part of what makes Perfect Days so brilliant is the fact that it is the city of Tokyo itself which serves as the main character, just as Wenders used Berlin as the main character for Wings of Desire almost forty years ago. With the help of Franz Lustig’s breathtaking camera work, across the course of the film, Wenders manages to show us an incredible amount of the unique natural beauty, technology, architecture, transportation, and cuisine that defines Tokyo. It is the complex ecosystem of daily life in this city of fourteen million people that captures our attention throughout the films two hour runtime, making us almost forget about the lack of dialogue or conflict.
Perfect Days opens by introducing us to Hirayama, a middle aged toilet cleaner working in the bustling neighborhood of Shibuya. To western audiences, such a plot may sound almost comedic, but if you’ve ever had the good fortune of using the bathroom in Japan, you’ll have some more appreciation for what this job entails. It’s not just that Japanese toilets are decades ahead of their American counterparts in terms of comfort and technology, but perhaps more importantly, even the most underused metro bathrooms in the Tokyo subway stations are as clean or cleaner than the facilities you might find in a fine dining restaurant in the states. When you walk in, you are greeted by spotless white ceramic, looking like the entire bathroom came straight off the assembly line. Sitting down on the toilet, one feels like a feudal monarch, your bottom warmed by the pristine seat as you go about your business. This is all thanks to people like Hirayama, a tireless craftsman who takes pride in his work, treating each toilet like an art piece of his own. For his part, Wenders also takes Hirayama’s job incredibly seriously, paying meticulous attention to the actual process and craft of toilet cleaning, showing a sincere reverence for this profession and all those who toil day by day to make the world a cleaner, kinder, place to live. Hirayama is also a devoted photographer and gardener, serving as an effective avatar for the filmmaker in his love and appreciation for the arts. Unlike Wenders however, Hirayama is apparently uninterested in using his photography or green thumb to make money or build a career, instead content to keep these passions as hobbies that create a meaningful sense of purpose and fulfilment.
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For the first couple of mornings depicted, Hirayama’s routine is practically identical, beginning each day with a nice shave and an espresso before hitting the road. Hirayama’s travels are soundtracked by an excellent selection of tunes from the 60’s and 70’s, including many of my parents’ car ride favorites by Otis Redding, Lou Reed, Nina Simone and Van Morrison. Totally divorced from the burdens of modern technology, Hirayama listens to all of his music on cassette, blissfully unaware of Spotify. At the end of each day, Hirayama goes to the public baths and then to a favorite restaurant where he gets a drink and a snack before heading home for a night of quiet reading and relaxation. Sure, there are some little episodes of action here and there. For instance, Hirayama’s spirited younger assistant, Takashi, who is hilariously fixated on ranking everything in life out of ten, tries to seek Hirayama’s help in pursuing a girl and tries to convince Hirayama to sell his tapes. For the most part though, what we get in the first half of the film is entirely slice of life. It’s clear that Hirayama lives quite a solitary existence, but he never seems bitter or unhappy, instead he seems to take solace in the quiet, and is able to find contentment in the smallest moments, like when he plays asynchronous tic tac toe against an anonymous opponent in one of the bathrooms he cleans.
While undeniably monotonous, Hirayama’s routine is made to seem anything but boring. He clearly takes deep joy in his daily life, and has built a community for himself amongst the businesses he frequents. It is not until more than halfway through the film that we get the first sign of Hirayama having any sort of social or family life. We know nothing about Hirayama’s marital status, and for most of the of the film’s first half he is more or less alone. This changes when his niece shows up at his doorstep, having run away from home, bringing with her the first semblance of conflict. Through conversations with his niece, we learn that Hirayama is estranged from his sister, with Hirayama remarking that: “The world is made up of many worlds, some are connected and some are not.” When his sister finally comes to pick her daughter up, we see that she leads a life of luxury and is openly derisive of her brother’s chosen profession. The appearance of Hirayama’s sister gives clearer meaning to his earlier words, as Hirayama has found all the wealth he needs in his life of simplicity and he no longer needs any connection to the decadent and materialistic world of his family.
Hirayama’s most profound crisis comes shortly after his niece’s visit, when Takashi unexpectedly quits. Despite his loyalty and diligence as an employee, Hirayama is forced to work a double shift, his bosses initially failing to provide him with a new coworker. For a deeply humanist filmmaker like Wenders, this moment reads as a reality check of sorts, demonstrating that for all the joy and meaning that can be found in work, our employers and in fact the capitalist system at large ultimately doesn’t care about us. No matter how much of ourselves we give to our work, our bosses, just like Hirayama’s, will forget about us the first chance they get. Nonetheless, Hirayama perseveres, demonstrating that rarest of human attributes, an ability to adapt to the transience of things and the unyielding passage of time.
Much has been said about the various needle drops in the film, with particular attention given to the Lou Reed and Van Morrison moments, but for my money the best use of music in the film, and perhaps in any film I’ve seen in a very long time, comes with the very final shots. After engaging in conversations about the passage of time and mortality with an elderly Tokyo resident and a man dying of terminal cancer respectively, Hirayama drives to work once again, visibly engrossed in thought. We hear the vibrato sounds of Nina Simone’s incandescent voice, and as tears start to form in Hirayama’s eyes, the chorus to Feeling Good kicks in with the impact of a meteor. We stay in a close up of Kōji Yakusho’s unrelentingly expressive face, as in a tour de force of physical acting, he alternates between tears of melancholy and his signature kind smile. The camera stays here for over a minute, forcing us to sit in all of the discomfort and ambiguity, the agony and the ecstasy of Hirayama’s emotions, before ending on an establishing shot of the sun rising over Tokyo, as if to say that life will go on, and Hirayama will begin again tomorrow.
This final scene is an emotional puzzle key of sorts, unlocking a part of Hirayama’s interiority and vulnerability which we have been denied the whole movie. It’s also the best ending of the year and it alone makes Perfect Days’ worth the price of admission. The fact that Wender’s was able to make a film this powerful, half a century into his unusually prolific career is truly incredible and should not be understated. Perfect Days is truly one of the best movies of 2023 and hopefully will continue to receive the celebration it deserves.
