@article{article_1610806, title={LIVING WITHOUT THE PAIN OF EXISTENCE: AN ANALYIS OF THE MOVIE PERFECT DAYS}, journal={İnönü Üniversitesi İletişim Fakültesi Elektronik Dergisi (İNİF E-Dergi)}, volume={10}, pages={380–397}, year={2025}, DOI={10.47107/inifedergi.1610806}, author={Tutar, Hasan and Öztürk, Havva}, keywords={Varoluş sancısı, dünya ağrısı, yaşam doyumu, içsel huzur, manevi tatmin, minimal yaşam}, abstract={The protagonist, Hirayama, played with modest perfection by Koji Yakusho, actually finds solace in an uncomplicated existence. He lives alone in an apartment on the outskirts of Tokyo. After work, he washes himself in a bathhouse and eats at a cheap restaurant inside a subway station. In his truck, he listens to tapes of Patti Smith, the Kinks, Sachiko Kanenobu, and Lou Reed, and before going to bed, he reads novels by William Faulkner and Aya Koda. When he wakes up at sunrise, the cycle repeats. The movie Perfect Days contains subtle references to both Buddhism and Shintoism. Hirayama lives like a monk and has the personality of a monk. His love of music, the highest art form of life, gives the movie an unusual spirituality. Perfect Days seems almost hagiographic at times; its plot is more cosmic than simple. This is not a film about a man who cleans toilets; it presents a comprehensive portrait of a person who seems to have solved the secret of existence, and presents a striking narrative of days spent in a minimal life filled with inner peace, without any worldly pain. In the Filmim method, semiotic analysis was preferred to decipher visual and auditory signs. In this study, the purposeful sampling technique was used, with the film Perfect Days selected as the primary data source due to its rich symbolic narrative. The findings indicate that Hirayama is not a Buddha (yet), and his life is not completely free of pain. Although the background story, such as his encounter with his estranged rich sister and his longing gaze at a waiter, is largely unexplained, it suggests that Hirayama is sometimes disturbed by his past. “Perfect Days” strongly references the characters’ lives of inner peace, free from existential pain in the mundanity of daily life. The film skillfully blends the themes of human relationships and inner peace and invites the audience to a journey into themselves with its meaningful narrative.}, number={1}, publisher={İnönü Üniversitesi}