Some of the most interesting films I’ve seen lately come from directors who have nothing left to prove. Wim Wenders is one of them. He will be 79 this year and has made films like ‘Wings of Desire’ and ‘Paris, Texas’. He can probably get financing for whatever movies he wants, or maybe he even has enough resources to finance himself whatever dream or fantasy he wants to bring to the screen. Thoughts of retiring seem distant or non-existent to him. In the last 10 years he has added 18 titles to his filmography: short and feature films, fiction and documentaries, music videos of the music he loves and films about the visual artists he admires. Not only does Wenders seem like he has no intention of stopping, he’s always on the lookout, rejects clichés and the beaten path, and always has something interesting to say and something new to experience. ‘Perfect Days‘ is a tribute to Japan by an artist who deeply loves and respects this country, its people and its culture. It is a wonderful film about loneliness and about simple and sometimes invisible people, with a deeply human message: the world is made up of as many worlds as there are people, and everyone has their place under the sun and their life worth living. The film has already received several awards, but I think the most significant of them is the decision to be chosen to represent Japan at the Academy Awards this year. It is, I believe, a confirmation that the Japanese themselves had a great opinion about the quality and sensibility of the film according to their own criteria. It doesn’t even matter much whether the film wins the Oscar or not.
The original scriot is written by Wenders along with Takuma Takasaki. Hirayama, the main hero of the film, is an aging man who works in the cleaning service of public toilets in Tokyo. Anyone who has visited Japan knows how impressively clean Japanese toilets are. Their maintenance should therefore also be an honorable job. We follow Hirayama’s daily routine: he wakes up in his modest studio apartment in the big metropolis, rolls up his mattress that most Japanese people traditionally sleep on, brushes his teeth and trims his moustache, goes out into the street and looks up at the sky to see what the weather is like, buys an iced coffee from a vending machine, gets into his car old enough to be equipped with a tape player, and goes to work. The day’s work routine is interrupted by a break in which he rests in a park, eats a sandwich, looks at the people and especially at the trees that he photographs. He uses a film camera, seems to be a fan of decades-old devices, and listens to music on a cassette player, like the one I used to when I was a teenager many decades ago. His musical tastes are also retro – pop hits of the 60s and 70s. When he finishes work he goes to the public bath and then to a street restaurant. Always the same public bath, always the same restaurant. In the evenings, he reads novels by Faulkner or Patricia Highsmith in second-hand paperback editions bought for 100 yen. Life flows with small joys caused by details sought in nature or fleeting connections with those around, usually no more than glances or greetings. Events happen. A young co-worker asks for his help in winning over a girl, who in the end seems more interested in Hirayama’s music. His niece runs away from home and takes refuge with him for a few days, an opportunity to reunite after many years with his sister, a woman rich enough to afford a chauffeured limousine. In the bar where he drinks a glass of something stronger each weekend, the owner sings a Japanese version of ‘House of the Rising Sun’. Hirayama speaks little, but radiates empathy and a smile that will win all viewers towards the end.
One could say that ‘Perfect Days‘ is a film without a story, but how exciting it is for the viewers to watch what is happening on the screen! Every detail is studied and placed in its place, as happens in Japanese interiors or parks. The characters in ‘Perfect Days‘ are lonely people but their loneliness has a thousand shades, all rendered with discretion and thoroughness. Tokyo, the city that seems overwhelming to most tourists, is beautifully filmed and brought back to human dimensions. The music is great, but I’m being subjective here, as it’s the music of my generation. Wenders describes here that territory of intersection between Japanese and Anglo-American culture, which I observed in many Japanese colleagues when I visited Japan. About the acting creation of Koji Yakusho, I can only say that the fact that he is not nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actor seems scandalous to me. Good thing at least he was recognized and awarded at Cannes! ‘Perfect Days‘ is for me, so far, the best film of the year. I think it’s also one of those movies that holds up well and really grows in time.