Review: Perfect Days at Sydney Film Festival

June 20, 2023

We sent Addy Fong to check out Wim Wenders’ Perfect Days at Sydney Film Festival. Here are her thoughts:

Amidst the busyness of life, the hustle and bustle of the city, Wim Wenders presents us with Perfect Days, a film that invites us to slow down and observe the beauty of nature and its slowly changing states. Influenced by Japanese cinema through observational camera, slow paced camera movements, and minimal dialogue, Wenders film follows the life of Hirayama (Koji Yakusho) a toilet cleaner living in Tokyo who enjoys tending to his plants and taking pictures of trees.

Perfect Days, written by Wenders and Takuma Takasaki, is based on a collection of four short stories with Hirayama as the main protagonist that ties them all together. The result is a comforting and powerful watch, portrayed through interpersonal interactions between Hirayama and the other characters within the story, their shared history whether brief, fleeting, or heavily burdened by past experience. Amongst it all we find moments of joy, peace, and a sense of calm.

In a society which encourages a competitive work culture where job status and societal ranking matter, Hirayama’s career choice is frowned upon, as hinted through comments made by others throughout the film and the lack of acknowledgement from other characters in the film. In the first couple of scenes in the film, when Hirayama helps a lost child find his mother, the mother doesn’t notice or thank Hirayama for his efforts. It’s intriguing to reflect on the fact Wenders’ protagonist like many of his films are characters often lost, overlooked by society, and quietly observational and introspective. We, as audience members, are almost made to become introspective on our own lives, to think of the busyness we ourselves get caught up in, and the act of watching a film such as Perfect Days forces us to do this.

The film’s colour palate basks the character in a wash of blue, the colour of daylight, both a representation of a new day and also the possibility there is a wash of sadness or loneliness felt when no one understands. Wenders’ brilliance is in his portrayal of characters, seemingly ordinary and mundane, and their consideration of life’s philosophical questions and their own existence. They exist in a world that seems almost counter cultural, a subtle rebellion of societal expectation.

Without words, we understand Hirayama, his habits and patterns of behaviour, his love of routine and tradition. Enjoying simple things like reading books, listening to cassettes in his car, eating noodles at the bar, and tending to his plants in the morning, activities he has done for years. First 10 mins he doesn’t utter a word, ‘A man of little words’ his young colleague Takashi (Tokio Emoto) remarks. He is observant, meticulous, and quietly caring.

Koji Yakusho, who won best actor for his portrayal of Hirayama in Perfect Days, proves that the strength of portraying a character on screen isn’t through merely spoken dialogue, but the subtle unspoken movements and actions written in a script and in how a character is presented on screen. There is a strength and comfort provided to audiences who are respectfully allowed to feel and interpret the film as they see fit, sometimes the lack of dialogue and silent moments are the most powerful.

The film’s use of music is the only indication of Hirayama’s feelings or mood during certain moments of the film, his choice of music he plays in his car on his drive to work our only clue of his inner thoughts. Throughout the film we slowly learn more about him, and only towards the film’s conclusion we understand his feelings and only at the end we too share in a feeling of catharsis, a feeling of liberation where he, like many of us, finally feels seen.

Perfect Days plays on Wednesday 21st June at 7:45pm at Palace Norton Street and on Thursday 22nd June at 6:15pm at Dendy Newtown. For tickets and info, visit the SFF website.

Review by Addy Fong.