I’ve been trying to write this “review” for three days now. Somehow I just can’t get the right words out. So I’m going to just say exactly how this movie made me feel and hope it resonates. And if it doesn’t, please accept my apologies in advance.
Wim Wender’s Perfect Days is, in many ways, the perfect film. Great acting, great script, great cinematography. It’s sublime from start to finish.
So what is it about?
The long and short: it follows the life of a toilet cleaner in modern day Tokyo, who has carefully crafted a daily routine in which he seems to find peace and solace. He gets up at the same time every day to the sound of a man sweeping outside his house. He goes through the exact same motions from grooming to collecting his every day carry items and then heading out in his van to work, always with one tape or the other in the cassette player (yes our man Hirayama is pro-analogue even though it’s 2023).
Everything changes when his niece unexpectedly drops in on him. Truths unravel, his real identity comes to light and it leaves the viewer perplexed in the best possible way. Because in this perplexity are the answers we are all seeking about our own lives.
What if we had everything we could desire: a mansion in the Hills, ten Porsches, a gold watch. Would that really make us happy? Or can happiness be found in the little details, in rituals and routines. Do any of us stop to look up at the sky? Or the trees? Can any of us even wander around without experiencing life through a cell phone? Have we become so disconnected from the essence of life that what we perceive as happiness is in fact nothing more than an illusion that will someday just fall away to unveil bitterness and agony?
I loved watching Hirayama going through his routine. I loved watching how meticulously he cleaned toilets with an unparalleled sense of duty. I loved watching him go to the park, look up at the trees and take a picture with an old school camera that could fit in his breast pocket. I loved that he preferred silence, speaking mostly in grunts and gestures. Only when the occasion called for it would he actually say something and when he did speak, it was to the point and not caked in vague ambiguity.
Could Hirayama be Dharma in practice?
In Hindu scripture, there’s this concept of Dharma: dutiful action without attachment to the fruits. It means do what you need to do without thinking about the end result. It’s a simple enough concept to grasp, but how many of us actually practice it?
Think about the two main characters of the film, Hirayama and his assistant. While Hirayama goes about his job with that sense of purpose and duty, taking great care to wipe every surface with immaculate technique, his assistant:
- shows up late every day
- asks why Hirayama is taking the job so seriously when everything will just get dirty again
- half asses his way through the job
- is only after the pay check at the end of the gig
- doesn’t even last beyond a few weeks
One is acting out of Dharma. The other out of Adharma.
What does this mean in a wider context and why should we care about it at all?
Doing something with attachment to the fruits can often come at the detriment of the process. If you’re half assing it at your job, just waiting to get paid at the end of the month, you could be flagged for underperforming. If you’re shortcutting your way to starting a business, it’ll eventually collapse.
This brings another thought to me.
I’m imagining a scenario where Hirayama isn’t a toilet cleaner, but chooses to be a developer working for a tech company. I can see him writing every line of code, from start to finish, with that same sense of purpose and duty, without worrying about the end result and especially not thinking about his pay check. He’d show up every single day, log in, and just pick up where he left off coding.
Then I’m thinking about his assistant, who would show up late, half ass his coding and then ask an AI to fix it for him.
That’s what I’m observing more and more in the world. There’s no real sense of duty or purpose. It’s all about: how can I make the most money the fastest?
I’ve seen this with members of my own family. A cousin turns up for a job interview and blatantly lies about his qualifications with a memorised ChatGPT-generated script. He gets the job, asks AI how to do it and when he’s sussed out of it, he’s already made a few thousand dollars, enough to see him through to his next job. Where’s the sense of duty?
I had coffee with my parents over the weekend. My mum brought this up, asking “why don’t you get a contract like that, it pays X amount every week, look at how your cousin’s doing it.”
And that’s when I thought of Hirayama, how he moved through the day with grace and dignity, because he knew that he was good at what he did and he did the job well. I didn’t say anything, but I did walk away smiling, knowing that whatever it is I choose to do moving forward, it will be with that same sense of duty and without attachment to the fruits. And that’s what Dharma is all about and that’s important to me.
Going back to analogue
One thing I really paid attention to was how Hirayama embraced an analogue lifestyle. He bought physical books from a dollar bookstore. He listened to cassette tapes. He took pictures on an old school camera and had the film developed every week, storing them in these containers:
I didn’t even realised he had a phone (an old school flip phone) until much later in the film when he receives his first phone call from his assistant, telling him he’s quitting.
Seeing him live like this made me realise how much time I spend on screens. I made a little promise to myself to live more mindfully, to look up at the sky more, to notice the little things. Because those are the things that make life wonderful. Perfect even.
Antithetical to his family
I want to bring back the moment when his niece shows up. What I loved about her is that she was actually willing to learn from and work with her uncle.
And then her mother – Hiryama’s sister – shows up at his house to pick her up one evening. Let me repeat that. Hirayama’s sister rocks up in a chauffeured Beamer to get her daughter. In the build up to this moment, there’s already some clues that Hiryama is estranged from his family, like when his niece tells him that her mother changes the subject every time Hirayama comes up.
And then the sister drops this one line, when talking about their ailing father who’s in a nursing home and asks him to go visit, saying “he won’t act like he used to.” That one line tells us a lot about what we’re witnessing. Although it isn’t ever explicitly said in the film, it does leave a lot to the imagination.
Like in my head, I’m seeing a tycoon of sorts with millions in the bank who wants Hirayama to take over. Maybe Hirayama does, for a while, but he’s miserable. Everything feels so staged and contrived for him. Maybe he stops actually enjoying things. Maybe his curiosity and sense of wonder stop.
So he hands in his resignation, takes his final paycheck, buys a van kitted out with toilet-cleaning gadgetry, gets a studio in another part of the City and begins his new life. You can imagine the resentment this creates between father and son, with maybe a few words exchanged in the heat of the moment and this is where that “he won’t act like he used to” makes sense.
Pain disguised as duty?
Hirayama’s life seems perfect on the surface. He has his routine, his books, his music, his friends. But there’s also an undercurrent of pain that makes one wonder: is he doing all this to escape? Is it a way of coping? Is it avoidance of the deeper, more lasting issues? Or does it simply make him happier in a way that nothing else could?
Whatever the case, my main takeaway is that joy can be found in the little rituals, the routines and just remembering to stop and look up at the sky once in a while, all while showing up and doing what you need to do dutifully. Thank you Hirayama!
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