‘Perfect Days’ - AFI Fest

While I sit at my desk for my 9-5 corporate job I look out the window waiting for the day to tend thinking about what life would be like if I left the city for a rural mountain town. Speeding through my days waiting for big moments to happen it wasn’t until I watched Perfect Days that I realized the importance of the small moments of life and simply connecting with the senses around me making a life worth living.

Hirayama starts his days in his naturally orange-lit, Tokyo apartment before grabbing a coffee from the vending machine and heading on his way to his job. He spends his days traveling over the city cleaning toilets. Hirayama is never defined by his occupation, but by how he goes through a very repetitive life. He is driven by the simple pleasures of life like a new cassette or eating a sandwich on the park bench. He doesn’t have the most glamorous job, it's one you expect to bring a lot of sadness due to its solitude. It is not his work that gives him purpose, but to give him the means to live.

Using a 1.33:1 aspect ratio, Wim Wenders captures the small moments in a man’s life serving as a meditative experience to reflect on our own lives. In the midst of a repetitive routine are the simple details that add clarity and a soul to the tasks at hand that poise the difference between humanity and robots. Personality is unlocked as the patterns give way to introducing this character without any dialogue necessary. The composed facial gestures and soundtrack aids as a window into his mind. The smallness slowly builds to an emotion without any sort of spectacle. Wenders centers on the things that bring meaning to life free of the cynicism that usually inhabits it.

Wenders expands the world through the design of each public toilet across Hirayam’s route. Each one has a distinct architectural design intuned with its environment that weirdly creates compelling characters for places. Each time we revisit them it's like being reunited with a friend and checking in on what's happened since the last time you spoke. These beautiful structures fit Hirayama’s intense cleaning rituals hitting every single inch of the public facility that one would never think to clean. All his tools needed are neatly packed in his van ready to be put to the task. Hirayama is never rushing to get through his work, even taking steps outside to allow people to use the restroom while he is working. The system is a part of his living.

Hiryama drifts through the city invisible but playing an essential role. Wenders is hinting that even the smallest roles in the economy can hold bliss that might be missing from those in the 1% constantly stressed looking into the future and not what is in front of them. Life here is stripped of the nonsense to its purest essentials that fulfill both the professional and personal life of one man. Each day is slightly changed based on what he chooses from his extensive cassette collection to set the tone. There is a rhythm to his days that is soothing exploring kindness and generosity through his interactions with the environment and people.

So often we have films and TV that look down on the mundaneness of life, but there is something refreshing to what Wenders does here. He asks us to put away our judgments and immerse ourselves into this character and his routine with its little steps. Hirayama adds value to his life not through his role but through how he fulfills his time. This is not a story about moving up in the world but being comfortable with where you are. Multiple times on his routine he takes a moment to eat lunch under the trees and takes in the lushness around him with a breath. Hirayama is attuned to his senses and how it connects to the nature around him and maybe that is actually the true feat of success.

Watching this film was a cathartic journey where I let go of all the high-stress expectations I had put on myself to just immerse into a world where none of that matters. Immediately after the film ended I restructured my entire life thinking about how I better become one with my mind and body and stop anticipating moments that have not taken place yet. When we let go and embrace the small joys of our day whether it's going to a morning yoga class or drinking our favorite warm drink, we add new dimensions to our life. Taking the moment to slow down and enjoy what is happening around us is essential. Wenders beautifully depicts that ideology through Perfect Days and it feels amazing.

Of course, in order there is always a mess which we see through Hirayama’s coworker Takashi. Takashi sees their job as a form of payment quickly rushing through in order to get to things they deem more important. The complete opposite of Hirayama is this anxious character who feels like a misfit in the curated world of Hirayama, like they have not mastered the same level of piece Hirayama has. Takashi desires for something more which leads to this flustered energy unclear. Even when Hirayama is faced with disruption he never let anger define his day, he is always ready to adjust such as when his niece Niko arrives. We see these two generations coming together as Hirayama makes his routine into two for them to both take part in.

The fragmented moments of bliss pieced together create a poetic ambience of peace made possible by sacrifices and practice.