Here comes the quiet life again

Enjoyed Wim Wenders' new movie Perfect Days. Shot on video in Tokyo in a little over two weeks, it shares many elements with Paris, Texas: a broken family, confined spaces, a silent man, the resonance of daily rituals.

The director acknowledges the film's minimalist vibe is not only about the fictional character:

"There's too much of anything [now] and you cannot handle it. All the books I buy, all the colours and paints I buy… because I always wanted to paint a little bit again… I can open a paint store! And I have too much of everything in my own life – like everybody else I know – and not enough time. And Hirayama was the man I have inside me who has enough of everything and he doesn't need more. He never has the feeling he misses anything."

I'm also enjoying Tarjei Vesaas' novel The Birds which I picked up at random in a book store in Singapore. The author's brightly painted study with its combination writing desk and bed can be admired here.