Wenders making a film about fancy public restrooms in Japan

By YURI KAGEYAMA
Associated Press

TOKYO (AP) — Wim Wenders is making a film about high-end public restrooms in Japan. The renowned German director spoke with reporters Wednesday in Tokyo’s fashionable Shibuya district, where the dozen public restrooms are located. The facilities were designed by leading architects including Kengo Kuma and Tadao Ando, with the idea that a pleasant public restroom could counter the common expectation it had to be filthy. The Oscar-nominated director of “Wings of Desire” and “Buena Vista Social Club,” said the film’s hero will be a sanitation worker who sees his job as a craft and a service for the people. Actor Koji Yakusho has been cast in the lead role.