"PERFECT DAYS"
He became the guardian of those toilets.
The Long interview with director Wim Wenders [Part 1] "Where did a man named Hirayama come from?" "Paris, Texas" "Berlin: Angel Poem" Wim Wenders is a master craftsman who has continued to create many masterpieces such as "Buena Vista Social Club".
"PERFECT DAYS" starring Koji Yakusho, whom he has respected for many years, depicting the daily life of a public toilet cleaner in Shibuya, Tokyo, will be released nationwide on December 22nd.
<STORY> Hirayama (Koji Yakusho), a toilet cleaner in Shibuya, Tokyo, lives a quiet and calm life. At the same time, he woke up, got ready the same way, and worked the same way. Each day may seem like the same thing repeatedly, but no two days are the same, and the man lived each day as if it were a new day. His way of life was even more beautiful. The man loved trees. He squinted at the sunlight filtering through the trees. An unexpected event occurs in the days of such a man.
[Part 1] "Where did a man named Hirayama come from?" Extended interview with director Wim Wenders_"PERFECT DAYS"
//Summary - Level-C2//
In an extensive interview, director Wim Wenders recounts the genesis of Hirayama's character, whom actor Koji Yakusyo and singer-turned-monk Leonard Cohen initially inspired. The story evolves from Wenders' fascination with Yakusyo's performance into a profound tale of transformation. Hirayama, portrayed as a successful businessman disillusioned with his life, experiences a spiritual awakening triggered by a single moment of sunlight. This epiphany leads him to abandon his affluent lifestyle for a more spartan, more fulfilling existence as a public toilet attendant, embracing nature and photography. Wenders' story blends personal inspiration, existential insight and a deep appreciation for life's simpler pleasures, culminating in Hirayama's journey towards contentment and self-discovery.
1)
The first time I noticed Koji Yakusyo was in the Film "Shall We Danced", and I watched the film three times in a row because I wanted to know how he achieved this lightness of being. I thought he was just a fantastic actor, then I returned to the next film, "Babel", and realised it was the same guy.
But of course, this is the actor. This is the part where the man called Hirayama slowly revealed himself after I saw the locations of all the beautiful places to "THE TOKYO TOILET", the architectural wonders and when together with Takuma-san. We came up with the idea to tell the story of a man responsible for keeping them clean and dedicated to these places.
2)
Then Hirayama slowly took shape, and I remember that when he saw the sun, he was a bit like a monk and described his monk-like eyes when he woke up, and I could relate to the idea that Hirayama was a monk. I knew a few monks, and they were all highly gentle people. They all also had a sense of humour, at least the monks I met, and my favourite monk then became a little bit of my image of Hirayama.
3)
My favourite monk was a monk for ten years or so, and you all know him as a singer, Leonard Cohen, who lived in Mount Baldi in northern California, a Zen monastery, and he applied there.
He first told me how he was just an apprentice for the first year or so and how he had to do all the necessary work. He had to clean toilets, and I had Leonard Cohen in front of me when I first imagined a monk cleaning toilets, and then slowly, of course, the idea of the monk disappeared, and what was left was just a gentle person who liked to be in the company of other people service.
4)
Still, I admit I had the face of Leonard Cohen in my mind when I was preparing for the submission, and then, of course, I had the look of Koji Yakusyo. I didn't need any other faces in front of me, but when I was imagining when we were writing the script, I was thinking of Leonard Cohen secretly. I have never told anyone until now.
5)
So thank you, Leonard. You were accommodating because I loved your story of when you first came to the monastery and when you found yourself cleaning toilets. I love that, anyway, it fits our story, and then slowly, in my mind, I was thinking of the face of Koji Yakusyo. I didn't need any other look in front of me. Hirayama was certainly not a man who cleaned toilets from the beginning.
6)
He had a different life; he had a privileged life, at least that's how I imagined him. He had a life as a businessman, a successful businessman, we agreed on that, and then I still try to remember or find out in my mind how such a business person could make such a significant change and how Hirayama, if he was rich and drove a big car and had many employees, how he could become like a monk.
7)
A self-sufficient man in a modest apartment with nothing but his music and some trees, some little trees, and I thought to myself something must have happened to him at some point, something must have occurred to him that made him choose a different way of living, and I knew that was important for the actor, actors don't just want to know how to do this.
He wanted to know who they were to do this or that, so I knew Koji Yakusyo would eventually ask me why this man was doing this and living this life.
8)
Where he comes from, why he has this rich sister who comes and shows up in an expensive car, like Lexus, and what his past is. Then, I wrote down for him the idea that, in my mind, was the turning point in Hirayama's life. I thought he had been rich, influential, and a businessman.
Still, he had also been drinking a lot, as other people do, and he had not enjoyed his life as a businessman, but he kept on drinking more and maybe now and then.
9)
He was drinking, and his life was going downhill because he was not fulfilled. He would sometimes wake up in a hotel room, and he didn't even know how he ended up there.
He was a bit disgusted with himself and this life, and as these things went on, his life slowly went downhill. Even though he was still a respected businessman and rich and everything, he was filled with more and more disgust for it, so much so that sometimes he even thought of ending his life, but he didn't know how to end it, so "suicide" for him is not an option.
10)
The only option was to lead a radically different life, but how so? I imagined that one morning, he woke up from a nightmare and was in this cheap, ugly hotel room, and he had no idea how he got there and had a headache.
He was staring at himself, and then suddenly, a ray of sunlight came and hit him, and it came through some leaves. He looked at the one next to him, and there he saw the leaves moving in the wind, and he looked back at the window, and the ray came through the clouds there, and he had a sudden, very existential realisation. He realised that no one else saw this except him.
11)
This ray of light was not for any other human being, and no one saw it. No one noticed the light on the wall except him. He realised that the light had travelled millions of miles from the sun to reach him and that the light had taken several seconds to get there to catch him and create for him this beautiful little miracle, this fantastic play of light. He realised he was unique and he was not just a businessman.
12)
And he realised that he was unique and not the businessman who was lost among millions of others. He was an exceptional person, and this light showed him that.
Suddenly, he realised that this could open the way to another light, this ray of light and the leaves on the wall because it made him incredibly happy and satisfied. He realised that he didn't need the big car outside and he didn't need the office. He didn't need this life. He could live and be happy with the light and the trees because the trees and their leaves created this spectacle just for him.
13)
He liked it so much that he tried that life where the only thing he needed was to see that ray of light and the wind in the trees now and then, and whenever he saw it, he was happy. Then he gave up his job because he realised that the job didn't make him happy and all the money he was making didn't make him happy. He moved to a simple place and found a simple job that guaranteed that he would see those toilets now and then, and he became the guardian of those toilets.
14)
And they all have trees around them, and he could do something beneficial and work alone, and now and then, he would feel his uniqueness. He would think he could be of service and that he was about to start a helpful life and become just Hirayama. He remembered that as a boy, he had taken photographs, so that was one thing that he took up again because it allowed him to capture somehow these lights and the trees that he began to like more and more, and it was like a gesture of reverence.
15)
Towards the trees and the light photography for him became an act of saying thank you to the light. The simpler his life became, the happier he was until he was in that little flat in Oshiage and had a steady job and went there every morning and took a photograph every once in a while and respected the light and in the trees and, of course, every person he met because if he accepted himself as unique, then everyone else was too so he became a monk without knowing it I don't think he was living in his mind.
16)
I don't think in his mind he was living the life of a monk; he was living the life that he was beginning to like, and the light and the trees had saved him from living that life, so he was living that life in honour of the light and the trees and he was becoming a person who was happier than he had ever imagined. Still, he didn't think of himself as a monk.
Of course, I thought of him as a monk, but we know why the light helped him become that unique person, and I sometimes think that it lent this monk a guiding chance.
17)
Face this monk when I didn't know him yet, so here's my Hirayama story, and then, of course, Koji Yakusyo sure became that person so much that I didn't need any other imagination and that I didn't need my account anymore.
There he was, and he was Hirayama, and he showed me with his eyes how grateful he was for his work and the light. My favourite thing we shot was when he came out the door in the morning and looked at the sky. He had a little smile on his face. That was my favourite thing, and that's why we kept it.
18)
The beginning of every day is a little ritual of looking up. Maybe you saw the Tokyo Sky Tree, but he smiled at the clouds, saying, "Okay, I'm ready for the correct one, so here I am.
Hirayama is really in every person. Hirayama is in everyone.
If we accept the Hirayama within ourselves, I once made a film where I had a similar, similar situation of having to explain to my actors who they were and just as I didn't tell the actor that I thought he was a monk, I told him the story of the light.
19)
I had a bit of the same situation with the two actors who played the angels in "Berlin: Angel Poem". I mean, they knew they had to play angels, of course.
Still, they wanted to know what are we doing, how are we playing angels in the same way that Koji Yakusyo wanted to know how am I playing Hirayama here, what is it about him, and it was the same answer: it's the way you look at the world, it's the way these angels look at people and love them here, Hirayama had this loving look at people too.
20)
Things started with a tree and the light, but then it went on to everything else. It's how Koji understood that Koji Yakusyo began to have this look full of love and respect not just for his trees but for every person he sees. Everyone is the only one who sees people experiencing homelessness. All the other people walk by people walking by. He sees him, and he gives him respect anyway. Koji Yakusyo became HIrayama so much that I almost forgot where the name came from. I didn't make the name up. Maybe I could do it.
But I didn't dare to say that the HIrayama reminded me of the name Yasujiro Ozu in the Tokyo story. He was here, so it seems evident that our man was called here. I like the sound of it, but I also like the idea that there was a previous role in another film for the name. Anyway.
[Part 1] "Where did a man named Hirayama come from?" Long interview with director Wim Wenders_"PERFECT DAYS."
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3rtwl8xN_PE
Film "Perfect Days" (2023) - 7.9/10
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt27503384/
I just know what enough is.
[96th Academy Awards] "PERFECT DAYS" nominated for Best International Feature Film! Wim Wenders makes a joyful comment
https://eiga.com/news/20240123/23/
Add info)
[Part 2] "Fiction or Documentary? Long interview with director Wim Wenders_"PERFECT DAYS."
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0pQJ9-wrLVA
//Summary - Level-C2//
In an interview, Wim Wenders discusses the blurred boundaries between fiction and documentary in the making of "Perfect Days". Initially unsure of the film's genre, the process mirrored documentary filmmaking, with spontaneous, unrehearsed scenes led by actor Koji Yakusyo. Wenders relished this fluidity, aiming to capture documentary moments in fiction and vice versa. The narrative of Perfect Days blends Hirayama's fictional story with a documentary-style exploration of his daily routines. This approach reflects Wenders' fascination with the interplay between reality and imagination in storytelling, illustrated by his experience with the "Buena Vista Social Club" project, where fiction unexpectedly infiltrated the documentary. Wenders celebrates the seamless integration of fiction and documentary in Perfect Days, fulfilling a long-held dream of simultaneously creating a film that embodies both genres.
1)
I was never really sure if we were telling a fictional story with Perfect Days or if it was somehow a documentary. We shot it like a documentary; I mean, the process of shooting it was precisely the process of making a documentary.
France shot everything handheld, and we attacked at breakneck speed. We gave up rehearsing after a while because Koji Yakusyo allowed us to do that and got into the same rhythm that we were in. Ultimately, we came across so much Hirayama that we were shooting a documentary in many ways.
2)
And a lot of times, we would shoot a scene, and we just basically knew that he was going to come up the stairs in his room and start cleaning it, and that was all he knew, and then he did it; we never rehearsed it.
3)
Sometimes, he would show us things; occasionally, he would say I'm going to do something, but like, just let me do it, and you won't even know, and then he would come up with the newspapers and the bucket of water and start cleaning the tatami room the way his grandmother had always done it.
And we had no idea why he put the wet newspaper in little pieces. What is this? But of course, we filmed it like a documentary.
4)
We were observing a man doing what he always does in the course of his day and the course of the routine of his day, and our actor allowed us to do it that way; a lot of actors don't feel safe if they can't rehearse and know precisely what they're supposed to do.
5)
Our approach, our documentary approach, is a bit risky for actors. Still, Koji Yakusyo got increasingly into it, and sometimes, because there were other actors involved, he was even surprised that we did rehearse sometimes. Still, we had to do it mainly for the other actors, not so much for him.
6)
He and France got along so well; it was just moments that France sometimes magically anticipated his movements.
So I like that feeling, not knowing if it is a documentary or fiction.
Because in my fictional films, I'm always so happy if I can get one shot here or one shot there.
I love it when that happens, and I hope it also occurs in the fiction.
7)
So, I'm willing for a documentary moment to appear within the fiction. On the other hand, in my documentaries, I often try to bring in a little element of fantasy.
That's how we live: we respond to things happening around us. We live in response to something that we imagine and stories that occur to us from time to time, sometimes on tiny little levels, but occasionally big stories happen, big stories happen.
And the stories that happen are very different categories from the level we impose on, let's say, an actress in a film.
8)
So "Perfect Days" became a fantastic range of documentaries and fiction - the fiction was the character. The novel was about Hirayama's existence, but the way we shot his routine became more and more documentary because he knew more and more about what he was doing and why he was doing it, and I didn't have to explain it to him.
9)
He could show us instead, and that's what I realised in the course of the shooting, that's what I like so much in filmmaking: when the actor shows me what the scene is and I don't explain it to him, that's the range between fiction and documentary.
10)
And with documentaries, if you imagine "Buena Vista Social Club", I thought I was making a documentary.
We first shot in Havana, which I had never been to in my life, and it was a documentary, and then we made music sometimes, we went out with these older men in the streets, a classic documentary, I thought.
11)
We just wanted to shoot in Havana, and I went home. I had made a classic documentary of men recording music and living their lives. A few months later, the miracle happened, and they were allowed to play a concert together in Amsterdam.
12)
They had never performed on stage together because the band was utterly fictional. Ry Cooder had put together these studio musicians, and they had never been a band, so the fact that they became a band on stage was fictional. They were scared and acted like children. They were so full of stage fright because they had never been on stage together.
13)
We were shooting fiction when they did the concert, and I returned to my editing room, and now I have all this material from Havana. I had all this material from the fantastic show in Amsterdam, and I realised how slowly fiction was creeping into this documentary.
14)
Another three months later, the outrageous fiction happened. Although Cuba was not allowed to come to America because it was still under the embargo, and it seemed impossible that they would get visas, the whole man got the keys. It was still the Clinton age, where liberal things were possible, and Ry Cooder suddenly said we had to shoot again.
15)
These guys can all come to New York for two days and play a concert at Carnegie Hall. Carnegie Hall is paradise in the world of musicians; it is the Mecca where you want to play one day.
Then we filmed the concert, two concerts in Carnegie Hall, and what happened: these older men had become the Beatles.
16)
When we closed the Carnegi Hall, people were standing on their chairs, the whole Carnegi Hall, standing on their chairs, applauding, and people were already crying tears of joy when they just came on.
17)
So I realised that these men that we had filmed in Amsterdam cleaning shoes, nobody knew them, not even in Havana, not in Amsterdam, where these guys that we had filmed in Havana cleaning shoes and who had given a concert in Amsterdam where nobody knew them.
A few months later, people applauded them as if they were the Beatles, if that wasn't pure fiction or a fairy tale.
I didn't know how to film a fairy tale, so I thought I was making a music documentary and filming a miracle of life.
18)
So I know how things go and intersect in a fictional documentary, and you can never really define what it is, and that's the beauty of it in "Perfect Days"; I didn't have to make that effort.
It just happened that the routine of this man and his daily work and his going to work in the morning and driving his car and listening to music and coming home and taking a bath in the public bath and going to bed and reading all this was fiction and reality at the same time.
19)
And the film was never fictional nor mental; it was always both simultaneously, and that was a dream come true.
I always thought it should be possible, but I always had to work hard in fiction to make it feel like a documentary and in documentaries to make it feel fixed, but here, it suddenly just happened of its own accord.
20)
Maybe we had created the conditions that allowed fiction and documentary to work so well together.
I don't know what, I was happy every day I went to work because I knew it was a dream come true and I wasn't making a fictional story, I wasn't making a documentary, I was making a film that was both at the same time, I was good. Thanks to Hirayama.
Add info No2)
[Part 3] "What the story destroys" Long interview with director Wim Wenders "PERFECT DAYS"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=clyBjPpo9uo
[Part 4] "Let the audience be themselves" Long interview with director Wim Wenders "PERFECT DAYS"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y8oHxw31vWM
[Part 5] "Yasujiro Ozu is there" Long interview with director Wim Wenders "PERFECT DAYS"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IKH-ITpa8d8
[Part 6] "I don't know how to shoot, that's the ideal" Long interview with director Wim Wenders "PERFECT DAYS"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=slcjhiuudSY
"PERFECT DAYS" Koji Yakusho talks about acting <long version>
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tjatjdrlMI4
Film "Tokyo Story" - Trailer
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ih7usk8w2NY
[96th Academy Awards] "PERFECT DAYS" nominated for Best International Feature Film! Wim Wenders makes a joyful comment
https://eiga.com/news/20240123/23/
Koji Yakusho's interview with director Bim Wenders of the Cannes-winning film "PERFECT DAYS" [Details] A strange feeling during filming
https://www.tokyo-np.co.jp/article/297099
[Introduction] Wim Wenders introduction for those who enjoyed the movie "PERFECT DAYS"
https://mail.google.com/mail/u/0/#inbox/KtbxLvHXGbnXcDRShRWPvxDlgFHGcfvwhL?projector=1
Shall we Dance? - Trailer HD
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=psQCVq2W4TA
Shall we dance? 1996 - 7.7/10
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0117615/
Sugiyama, an office worker with an ordinary family and a monotonous life, sees a beautiful woman standing by the building window from the train one day. Unable to suppress his desire to meet the woman, Sugiyama heads to where she is. It was a ballroom dancing class that he had no connection to. When Sugiyama musters up the courage to step into the classroom, what awaits him is the beautiful woman he was looking for and the unique students.
Babel - Trailer
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yDNa6t-TDrQ
Film: Babel (2006) - 7.5/10
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0449467/
In Babel, a tragic incident involving an American couple in Morocco sparks a chain of events for four families in different countries throughout the world. In the struggle to overcome isolation, fear, and displacement, each character discovers that family ultimately provides solace. In the remote sands of the Moroccan desert, a rifle shot rings out -- detonating a chain of events that will link an American tourist couple's frantic struggle to survive, two Moroccan boys involved in an accidental crime, a nanny illegally crossing into Mexico with two American children and a Japanese teen rebel whose father is sought by the police in Tokyo. Separated by clashing cultures and sprawling distances, these four disparate groups hurt towards a shared destiny of isolation and grief. In the course of just a few days, they will each face the dizzying sensation of becoming profoundly lost -- lost in the desert, lost to the world, lost to themselves -- as they are pushed to the farthest edges of confusion and fear as well as to the very depths of connection and love. In this mesmerizing, emotional film that was shot in three continents and four languages -- and traverses both the profoundly personal and the explosively political -- acclaimed director Alejandro González Iñárritu (21 Grams, Amores Perros) explores with shattering realism the nature of the barriers that seem to divide humankind. In doing so, he evokes the ancient concept of Babel. He questions its modern-day implications: the mistaken identities, misunderstandings and missed chances for communication that, though often unseen, drive our contemporary lives. Brad Pitt, Cate Blanchett, Gael García Bernal, Kôji Yakusho, Adriana Barraza and Rinko Kikuchi lead an international ensemble of actors and non-professional actors from Morocco, Tijuana and Tokyo, who enrich Babel's take on cultural diversity and enhance its powerful examination of the links and frontiers between and within us.
PERFECT DAYS
https://www.academycinemas.co.nz/movie/perfect-days
Wim Wenders On Oscar Nomination And “All Hell Breaking Loose” During Lockdown Inspiring Peace For Japanese Film ‘Perfect Days’
https://deadline.com/2024/01/wim-wenders-oscars-perfect-days-interview-1235803042/
