(PS- This piece is more of a personal reflection — if you’re here only for conversations on mental health, feel free to skip. Wander where you need to go, gently. Not everything we encounter needs to resonate, and that’s perfectly fine. 😉)
Call Me Chihiro （ちひろさん） is my favorite film of the year.
Call Me Chihiro is not for everyone. For those accustomed to the fast-paced rhythms of Hollywood, Bollywood, or K-dramas, this film might feel too slow, too quiet — like ‘nothing happens.’
But for me, Call Me Chihiro is just right — just right for my heart, just right for my soul — exactly what I need. I’ve already watched it twice, and I’m sure there’ll be a third or fourth time. (I’ve also rewatched Shinya Shokudou （深夜食堂） and Kinou Nani Wo Tabeta （きのう何食べた） four or five times — but, of course, those are series rather than films.)
If I were to capture it in one line, the film is about what it means to be a fiercely authentic human, as well as the beauty of intimacy with those most would consider “strangers.” I feel like Chihiro is my spirit animal — I found myself resonating with her so deeply throughout.
Call Me Chihiro follows the story of Chihiro, a former sex worker who has left her past behind to work at a small seaside bento shop in a quiet suburban Japanese coastal town. The film does not have a single, punchy storyline but comprises a series of vignettes. The film captures the unique tenderness of love between strangers — not romantic or familial love, but the fleeting, almost ephemeral connections. Her relationships — with a lonely boy abandoned by his mother, a shy teenage girl yearning to be seen, and an older homeless man seeking dignity — are quiet and unassuming. Yet, through these seemingly simple gestures — sharing a meal, offering words of comfort, or sitting in silence — she brings warmth and subtle transformation to their lives.
What makes Chihiro so magnetic is her ability to hold space — for herself, for others, and for that lingering existential melancholy that hangs in the air. As philosopher Byung-Chul Han reminds us, in a world ruled by productivity and efficiency, we’ve lost the capacity for slowness, for simply being present with one another. In this “burnout society (Han, 2010),” where even relationships so often feel transactional, Chihiro is a potent antidote. She does it so quietly and yet so incisively.
She moves through life in a way that is deeply tender and deeply human.
Nothing is rushed. Nothing is denied. All emotions are welcome, all stories are allowed, held with an equal and sustained attention. It reminds me of what psychoanalysts call ‘evenly suspended attention’ — a kind of open presence that allows others to simply exist as they are, without the pressure to be more or less.
To me, the story is particularly meaningful in the way Chihiro artfully meanders between solitude and connection — a pertinent quest for the heretics amongst us. It captures so well that delicate, bittersweet ache of living a life untethered yet still seamlessly melted into the world around. Chihiro is visible, powerful, and profoundly potent in what she gifts to the world. Yet, she is undeniably alone — belonging to nowhere, tied down to nothing. She is a solid embodiment of the paradox of living authentically on the margins of a society that demands conformity.
But most importantly, I admire Chihiro because, to me, she represents radical self-creation and self-overcoming. Chihiro’slife is not dictated by inherited moral codes, societal expectations, or the need for external validation. Her past as a sex worker — a role so deeply stigmatized and misunderstood by the world at large, and especially in a society like Japan — is something she carries without recoiling, apologizing, or any indication of shame.
It simply is. No explanation is needed.
She embodies a calm defiance that feels almost subversive in its simplicity.
Everyone may be projecting something onto her — a mother figure, a friend, a source of nourishment, or even a pseudo-town-daughter. Yet Chihiro herself remains elusive, never fully inhabiting the roles they project onto her.
She resists being defined by their needs, refusing to be pinned down, refusing to be anything other than herself. It is this refusal — this quiet insistence on living authentically, unshaped by others’ expectations — that I deeply admire and aspire to achieve. Chihiro embodies the paradox of being fully present for others without ever losing herself, a reminder that selfhood and connection can coexist in the most natural, harmonious, elegant way.
However, being authentic does come with a cost, which many seem to forget when they embark on this path, but they get caught when they are subsequently judged, misunderstood, and exiled. Thus, I am relieved to see that the film does not romanticize her freedom in a one-dimensional way. Chihiro has chosen her path, but that freedom sets her apart, isolating her from the conventions and ready-made communities that bind others together — childhood schoolmates who stayed connected, neighbors in close-knit towns, or colleagues bound by the “lifelong contracts” that Japanese companies often offer.
Chihiro’s life, though deeply authentic, is marked by a lingering sense of aloneness — note, though, that I say aloneness, not necessarily loneliness. To me, solitude and aloneness are far from burdensome but have a quiet sweetness — liberating, invigorating, and charged with a palpable sense of possibility. It is a sweet ‘negative space’ that many of us have forgotten about.
Chiriho may look like a wanderer, a stranger/ outsider to us, but in reality, she tells the tale of what reality is, stripped bare of illusions many of us hold onto to fight off existential angst. Her connections — with a lonely boy, an awkward teenage girl, and a homeless man — are so very deep in their intimacy, but they are highlighted for how transient, incomplete, and fragile they are. All these bonds can disappear at any moment, just as they appeared — and as they did in the film.
By the end, it becomes clear that those around Chihiro wish to turn their fleeting moments with her into something permanent. The boy and the teenage girl want lifelong friendships, offering regular visits and check-ins. Others in the town urge her to stay.
Yet Chihiro just disappeared without warning, leaving no trace — just as the old man she first encountered in the film died quietly, unnoticed, unmarked.
This is why she does not fit into the norms.
This ability to let go, to walk away, may seem unsettling, even heartless. But when we judge her for that, what we might be forgetting is that, in fact, impermanence is the true nature of life and all human encounters. The truth of the world we inhabit is indeed just like that — transient, unable to be tied down, offering little certainty, no matter how much we cling to the illusions that say otherwise.
Chihiro embodies an unspoken understanding of mono no aware — the gentle, wistful awareness of life’s impermanence. Moments and connections, like life itself, are fleeting, yet she offers herself fully to each.
Is it gloomy? Beautifully melancholic, maybe. But perhaps it is this impermanence, this fleeting nature of connection, thatgives life its meaning.
Ultimately, I love Call Me Chihiro for how much I resonate with her way of life, how much I admire her authenticity and courage, and how poignantly she carries her story.
To me, the film is not as quiet as it seems. Beneath its stillness, it roars — reminding me of life’s true nature: transient, ephemeral, and beautifully melancholic.
Originally on Pecan Philosophy.
