![]() The couple have survived personal catastrophe, the death of their only daughter 20 years before, plus minor medical issues, including Kafuku’s recently diagnosed glaucoma. He enjoys a deep, passionate connection with his screenwriter wife Oto (Reika Kirishima), who shares her latest half-dreamed plot ideas with him during their sensually presented sex sessions. Kafuku (Hidetoshi Nishijima) is an internationally acclaimed stage actor and theater director feted for his Chekhov and Beckett productions. Set in Tokyo, the first act is a self-contained domestic tragedy. As Hamaguchi’s wounded protagonists embark on their own emotional journey, this theme resonates with increasing urgency. Taking his cue from Murakami’s brief reference to Uncle Vanya, he also elevates Chekhov’s melancholy stage classic into a recurring motif, repeatedly returning to Sonya’s closing speech about the need to stoically carry on living in the face of crushing disappointment. While Drive My Car is essentially faithful to Murakami’s skimpy original text, Hamaguchi has expanded the timeline, adding extra locations, secondary characters, deeper backstory and a creditable stab at dramatic resolution. Pitched firmly at festival and art-house audiences, Drive My Car cements his blossoming reputation as a skilled auteur, though it is unlikely to earn him an invitation to direct the next revved-up Fast and the Furious blockbuster. But his reputation has since recovered, co-writing Kiyoshi Kurasawa’s period thriller Wife of a Spy, winner of the best director prize at the 2020 Venice Film Festival, before picking up a Silver Bear himself at the 2021 Berlinale for his charming Tokyo triptych Wheel of Fortune and Fantasy. Hamaguchi last competed in Cannes three years ago with the offbeat romantic fable Asako I & II, which premiered to generally cool reviews. Screenwriters: Ryusuke Hamaguchi, Takamasa Oe, based on Drive My Car by Haruki Murakami Venue: Cannes Film Festival (Competition)Ĭast: Hidetoshi Nishijima, Masaki Okada, Toko Miura, Reika Kirishima, Park Yurim, Jin Daeyeon Given Marukami’s fondness for co-opting Beatles song titles, Drive My Car might equally have been called The Long and Winding Road. What’s past is prologue, even though it felt like half a movie already. This lethargic pace is underscored when the subtle opening credits finally appear almost 40 minutes into the story. ![]() Adapted from a short story of the same name by globally feted Japanese author Haruki Murakami, this highbrow road movie is an absorbing, technically assured piece of work with poetic depths and novelistic ambitions.īut it is also very slow and ponderous, motoring along in low gear for much of its three-hour runtime. Japanese writer-director Ryusuke Hamaguchi takes a leisurely detour along the lonely highways of love and loss, grieving and healing in his latest Cannes competition contender Drive My Car.
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