Non (Anong Houngheuangsy) is a young man that lives alone busying himself with the chores necessary to meet the needs of his meager existence. He works as a masseuse where he meets Kang (Lee Kang-sheng), another solitary man who suffers from pain in his neck and back, though with a slightly more extravagant abode than Non’s simple apartment. After a private session with Non, the two share a meal together before going their separate ways and returning to their respective loneliness. 

Days is a mediative work written and directed by Tsai Ming-Liang. At the start of the 127-minute film, we are informed that it was left intentionally un-subtitled, though there is not much dialogue to begin with here. The action of the film plays out in front of Tsai’s largely still camera as Non washes vegetables to prepare for a solitary meal or Kang undergoes an acupuncture session. The artistic effort here is admirable, and while it can be written off as pretentiousness in its most pure form, there are some rewarding moments for those who can endure what, at times, is a punishing test of patience. 

This more suggestive than explicit, glacial paced, pseudo-romantic tale is not necessarily new ground for Tsai who took the essence of his earlier work I Don’t Want to Sleep Alone (2006) and concentrated it here for Days. For the uninitiated, Days could be best described as Andrew Haigh’s Weekend (2011) if it was instead directed by Wong Kar-Wai. While Weekend is very clearly a fleeting gay romance, Days here has the colors and the ethereality which fill the frames in many of Wong Kar-Wai’s equally unorthodox relationship films. Days, however, is different in that it is not explicitly romantic in nature. Their encounter – though initially transactional – gives way to some lapses in professionalism which leads to its private and tempered eroticism. The film embraces sexuality in the climactic full body massage which Non performs on the ailing Kang, but the film is more focused on the pure power of the physical touch on these two solitary men and keeps that separate from the power of a sexual release which is notably absent from the film. 

For those still with the film, Kang pays Non for the massage and also gifts him a small music box which the two share a long, speechless moment listening to it play out. Afterward, they go to a shop for a meal together. True to his word, Tsai does not offer us any insight into what – if any – their conversation holds as we spy from across the street, our view constantly interrupted by the bustling city traffic. In the same way that Kang and Non will only be present for this brief moment in each other’s lives, we too will only be allowed quick glimpses of the pair as their time together is quickly expiring. They know the end is coming just as well as we do, but they also seem to understand that there was something special that happened in that hotel room together and while they do not want to lose that feeling, each man is either too comfortable in their loneliness or too afraid to reach out and welcome the other in so they will have to settle for the memories: the massage, the music, and the meal.  

We all carry tokens of loved ones from our past be it gifts from family members who have passed or previous lovers. Days is the story behind one of those tokens for Non, a man who, as we see, lives in a world mostly void of any true and meaningful interaction. There are few things that adorn his walls. The only belongings he has all serve a specific purpose, that is until he receives Kang’s music box. And as he plays it in that final scene, drowned out by the noise of the street waiting for the bus to take him back home, we can imagine with hope that the song is still playing faintly in Kang’s memory, too.