Simple tasks, simple pleasures
The girls in ‘Le Pupille’ by Alice Rohrwacher
The origin of the unexpectedly popular ‘Perfect Days’, directed by Wim Wenders, is unusual. Invited to Japan, a country he loves, to respond to the ‘Tokyo Toilet Project’, a collection of new and radically designed public lavatories, Wenders decided to make a feature instead of the short anticipated by the producers, and the result was a film that is two hours long and has almost no plot. The original idea for the story, according to the director, focussed on a rich and alcoholic businessman, Hirayama, who finds himself in a hotel room with no memory and considering suicide; after an epiphanic experience (the beauty of sunlight falling through leaves, which gave rise to the film’s first title, ‘Komorebi’), he decides to abandon his career and start life afresh, first becoming a gardener and then a lavatory cleaner. Little of this remains in ‘Perfect Days’ apart from vague hints that something difficult has happened in Hirayama’s past, his interest in growing plants at home in a small apartment, and a habit of taking photographs of light filtering through treetops.
The impact of ‘Perfect Days’ is due to the wonderful performance by Koji Yakusho, the veteran actor who plays Hirayama, whose life is at first presented to us at as a celebration of mindfulness and humility. He gets up early, washes, and gazes affectionately at the sky every morning; he drives to work, listening to old-fashioned Western rock music on cassettes, and spends the rest of the day in almost total silence, cleaning lavatories with care and attention - a disagreeable job were they not all new, fresh, and bright - which brings to mind an interesting connection with a passage in JunichiroTanizaki’s classic In Praise of Shadows about the spiritual aspects of Japanese privies. Hirayama usually goes to the public baths after work, and then to his favourite modest restaurant. He reads when he gets home, mainly Western novels, and most nights he has dreams, which are poetically rendered in moody monochrome.
Hirayama owns a mobile telephone, but besides his old-fashioned camera and tape-player he seems to have no use for other technology; he doesn’t appear to read newspapers or magazines, and pays for everything with cash. Except when speaking to a colleague or the people he occasionally encounters, he has no social life; he doesn’t initiate conversations and talks reticently. His thoughts and feelings, however, are amply suggested through his mercurial facial expressions. He has an emotional bond with Niko, his rebellious niece, and is estranged from his sister and father; as the film develops, it becomes clear that he is repressing some pain, probably connected with the family, and possibly with another intimate relationship.
‘Perfect Days’ is perhaps more complex than its apparent serenity might suggest. Hirayama’s equanimity is rooted in his carefully controlled boundaries; he reacts emotionally when unexpected things happen, impelling him to resort to alcohol and cigarettes in one extreme situation, and he seems to miss intimacy, at least with those with whom he feels close. Although not particularly happy, he is content, having come to terms with shifting moods of joy and sadness, life’s light and shadows. He accepts ambivalence. Importantly, he has followed his own path, doing what he wants to do and paying scant attention to other people’s expectations; he lives in composed defiance of society’s assumptions. Rejecting a culture of restlessness and casual connections, Hirayama remains present, active, and alert as he embraces modest tasks and interactions; he rises and goes out into the world, approaching life with deliberate intention and awareness, in quietly radical opposition to contemporary superficiality and materialism.
‘Le Pupille’, a mid-length film made by Alice Rohrwacher and released in 2022, a year before ‘Perfect Days’, also had its beginnings in a suggested commission. Like Hirayama, the young girls in an Italian orphanage and school resist the values of their world, but their actions are instinctive rather than conscious; they rebel against discipline and austerity, not self-indulgence and excess. The leading character, a young girl called Serafina, is also something of an outsider. ‘Perfect Days’ is sober, considered, and deals with adult feelings, but ‘Le Pupille’, inspired by a Christmas letter sent to a friend by the writer Elsa Morante, is mischievous, full of naughtiness and glee. Rohrwacher has said that the film is about pure and selfish desires, freedom and devotion, and the unrestrained anarchy that can flourish in the minds and eyes of pupils living in the confines of a strict boarding school.
The film is set on a Christmas Eve during World War II. The girls, deprived of distraction and entertainment, and provided with little food, live under the austere eyes of the nuns and especially of the Mother Superior, who regards every moment of fun and amusement as sinful. They are preparing to enact the Nativity scene at midnight, when villagers will arrive to offer gifts and donations in exchange for prayers, and as the girls are getting dressed, the nuns turn on the radio to listen to a news bulletin about the war. They are soon distracted and leave the room, and Serafina takes the opportunity to retrieve part of her costume that she had accidentally dropped, inadvertently changing the station on the radio; the girls begin to dance and sing along to a love song. The nuns return, shocked and dismayed, and the Mother Superior cleans their tongues with soap as punishment. Serafina doesn’t accept this, saying that she didn’t join in.
One of the villagers who attends the beautifully imagined and realised nativity scene is a rich woman who has tried to attract the girls’ attention earlier in the day. She asks for prayers for her lover, whom she says is having an affair, and in exchange offers a magnificent zuppa inglese, a large red cake, which she claims was made with seventy eggs; the nuns consider this to be a disgraceful piece of frivolity. The next morning, as the girls are served their modest Christmas meal, the Mother Superior shows them the splendid gift, which is of course of great interest, and suggests that they should each give up their portion, emphasising that all good children would willingly make the sacrifice. She intends to pass on the treat to the local bishop. Serafina, however, refuses to renounce her slice, pointing out that the Mother Superior has already told her that she is a ‘bad child’. The girls are sent to their room, but Serafina grabs a handful of the cake as she goes, joyfully sharing it with her companions. The rest of the zuppa inglese is eaten with much relish in a most unexpected way. The tale and its visual realisation are charming and slyly subversive; their good nature is such that even the nuns aren’t portrayed as altogether bad. At the film’s heart are the simple pleasures of gentle rebellion, of vivid innocence. ‘Le Pupille’ is a delight.
For further exploration:
https://www.perfectdays-movie.jp/en/ (includes trailer and interview with Wim Wenders)
Trailer for ‘Le Pupille’: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h0dLXNnIQfw
Interview with Alice Rohrwacher about ‘Le Pupille’: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=awp8mqaMCYM
Image on index page: still from’Perfect Days’
Current listening: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GFylNzdzENE&list=RDGFylNzdzENE&start_radio=1
Still from ‘Perfect Days’ by Wim Wenders