The floor of a middle-class home in Thailand is rarely truly silent. There is the hum of the refrigerator, the distant buzz of a motorbike on the street, and the rhythmic shush-shush of a broom. But in Ryuichi Hiroki’s "A Useful Ghost," the most profound sound is the mechanical whir of a vacuum cleaner that shouldn't be running.
It is a Cord Zero model. Sleek. Silver. Battery-powered. And, according to the grieving family at the heart of this story, it is currently inhabited by the spirit of their deceased mother. Also making waves in related news: Why Point Break is the Only Action Movie That Actually Matters.
We often treat grief as a cloud—something ethereal that floats above us, occasionally raining down tears. We rarely talk about grief as a chore. Yet, anyone who has lost a foundational member of a household knows that the first thing you notice isn't the absence of their soul; it’s the sudden accumulation of dust. The dishes stay in the sink. The carpet becomes gritty. The logistics of life begin to fail.
Hiroki’s film, which recently captured hearts and awards at Cannes, takes this literal "mess of grief" and gives it a motor. Further insights on this are covered by E! News.
The Mechanics of a Digital Afterlife
Consider the traditional ghost story. Usually, the spirit returns to settle a score, to scream from the attic, or to rattle chains in a display of Victorian theatrics. These ghosts are high-maintenance. They demand exorcisms and priests.
The ghost of the mother in this narrative is different. She is practical.
She realizes that her husband and son are struggling to maintain the basic standards of hygiene. So, she does what she likely did for decades: she cleans. She migrates her consciousness into the smart vacuum, navigating the floorboards with a jagged, spectral precision.
There is a devastating irony in seeing a high-tech appliance become a vessel for the ancient concept of a restless soul. We live in an era where we outsource our labor to "smart" objects. We have Siri to remember our appointments and Roomba to handle our filth. By placing a mother’s spirit inside a vacuum, Hiroki asks a biting question: Was she always just a utility to them?
The father and son watch the vacuum move. They don't scream. They don't run. They simply lift their feet so she can get the dust bunnies under the recliner. It is a quiet, domestic horror that feels uncomfortably like love.
Why We Cling to the Haunted Object
The film works because it taps into a universal human desperation. We are terrified of the "finality" of the funeral. We want a loophole.
If you have ever kept a late loved one's voicemail saved on your phone just to hear the way they say "hello," you understand the pull of the useful ghost. You are keeping a digital fragment of them alive to perform a service—the service of comfort.
But a voicemail cannot clean your house.
In the film, the utility of the ghost creates a bizarre new status quo. The family begins to rely on the possessed vacuum. It becomes a bridge between the world of the living and the dead, built out of plastic and HEPA filters. But as the battery drains and the sensors clog, the reality of the situation begins to grate. You cannot hug a vacuum. You cannot ask a vacuum for advice on a breakup or how to cook the family’s signature curry.
You can only watch it bump into the baseboards.
The Invisible Stakes of Domestic Labor
There is a subtle, sharp critique of gender roles hidden beneath the "quirky" premise. The mother, even in death, cannot find rest because the men she left behind are incapable of functioning without her labor. Her "haunting" isn't a choice; it’s a sentence. She is tethered to the floor because the floor is dirty.
This isn't just a Thai story. It is a global one. Statistics consistently show that women perform the vast majority of unpaid domestic work. Hiroki turns this sociological fact into a supernatural trap. The mother is a "useful" ghost, and that usefulness is exactly what prevents the family from truly mourning her. They aren't mourning a person; they are maintaining an appliance.
The film forces the audience to confront the "invisible" work in their own lives. Who is the person in your house who notices when the milk is low? Who is the one who remembers that the guest towels need washing? If that person died tomorrow, would they feel compelled to come back and fix the Wi-Fi just so you wouldn't be inconvenienced?
The Glitch in the Soul
Technological ghosts bring a specific kind of frustration. In one scene, the vacuum gets stuck on a rug—that familiar, pathetic spinning of wheels that every robot vacuum owner knows.
The son has to flip it over and pull hair out of the brush roll.
Think about that moment. He is performing maintenance on his mother’s vessel. The line between caretaking and repair blurs until it disappears. This is the "glitch" in the narrative of the digital afterlife. We think we want our loved ones to stay in any form possible, but we don't consider the indignity of the hardware.
The film moves away from the "dry" facts of a typical festival winner and leans into the tactile reality of the machine. The sound of the motor becomes a heartbeat. The orange light on the "Power" button becomes an eye.
A New Grammar of Grief
Standard cinema tells us that grief follows a linear path: denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance.
"A Useful Ghost" suggests a sixth stage: Maintenance.
We live with the things people leave behind—the half-finished knitting projects, the browser tabs left open, the subscriptions that keep charging their credit cards. We are surrounded by "useful" ghosts every day. Hiroki just had the courage to put wheels on one and let it loose in the living room.
As the film reaches its crescendo, the novelty of the possessed vacuum begins to fade, replaced by a profound, aching sadness. The vacuum is a reminder of what is missing, not a replacement for it. The cleaner the floors get, the emptier the house feels.
Ultimately, the ghost isn't there to clean the house. She is there to show them that a clean house is a hollow victory if there is no one there to make a mess in it.
The silver machine continues its circuit. It reaches the edge of the stairs. It senses the drop. It pauses. For a second, the mechanical sensors and the human soul are in perfect alignment, staring into the void of the downstairs hallway, wondering if it's finally time to let go of the handle and fall.
