{"id":6661,"date":"2024-10-23T13:22:59","date_gmt":"2024-10-23T17:22:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/?p=6661"},"modified":"2024-10-23T13:22:59","modified_gmt":"2024-10-23T17:22:59","slug":"drive-my-car","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/2024\/10\/23\/drive-my-car\/","title":{"rendered":"Drive My Car"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"Drive My Car <\/strong>(2021)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Janus Films\/Drama\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 RT: 179 minutes\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 No MPAA rating (sexual content\/references)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Director: Ryusuke Hamaguchi\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Screenplay: Ryusuke Hamaguchi and Takamasa Oe\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Music: Eiko Ishibashi\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cinematography: Hidetoshi Shinomiya\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Release date: November 24, 2021 (US)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cast: Hidetoshi Nishijima, Toko Miura, Masaki Okada, Reika Kirishima, Park Yu-Rim, Jin Dae-Yeon, Sonia Yuan, Ahn Hwitae, Perry Dizon, Satoko Abe.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Spoken in Japanese w\/English subtitles<\/strong><\/p>\n

Rating<\/strong>: ****<\/p>\n

\u00a0The Japanese drama Drive My Car<\/strong> runs just one minute shy of three hours, yet it doesn\u2019t feel that long. I\u2019m aware of how trite this sounds, but it\u2019s the God\u2019s honest truth. It\u2019s easier to sit through than several recent films of near-equal length or shorter. Eternals (156 minutes) felt like an eternity. The Matrix Resurrections (148 minutes) never comes to life. I could name others, but you get the idea. What\u2019s most interesting is that Drive My Car<\/strong> is not a movie of action. No car chases, no gun fights, no explosions, NOTHING. Things do happen, but it\u2019s really more about the characters and how they react (or don\u2019t react).<\/p>\n

\u00a0Directed by Ryusuke Hamaguchi (Wheel of Fortune and Fantasy), Drive My Car<\/strong> is something of a breakthrough for the Japanese filmmaker who stands a good chance of pulling a Bong Joon Ho (as in the director of 2019\u2019s Parasite) at this year\u2019s Oscar ceremony. It\u2019s up for four Academy Awards including Best Picture and Best International Feature. It definitely deserves to be listed among the elite. It\u2019s an extraordinary film. It\u2019s a sad, beautiful and poignant drama about loss, regret, guilt, acceptance and self-discovery. It\u2019ll take some patience on the viewer\u2019s part, but it\u2019s richly rewarding in the end. Contemplative and introspective, it\u2019s a road trip of the emotions.<\/p>\n

\u00a0The protagonist is one Yusuke Kafuku (Nishijima), a stage actor and director living the best life he can. He\u2019s married to Oto (Kirishima), a screenwriter with a unique method of conceiving stories. They come to her while she has sex with her husband. Unable to remember them afterwards, Oto narrates them to Yusuke who fills her in the next morning. They share a comfortable marriage. They love each other, but they\u2019ve grown emotionally distant since the death of their young child years earlier. Yusuke is a stoic, reticent sort who keeps his feelings bottled up. He doesn\u2019t even react when he catches his wife in bed with another man.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Oto\u2019s latest story is about a teenage girl who regularly sneaks into the home of a classmate she\u2019s infatuated with. She narrates the tale to her husband who listens intently. Unfortunately, tragedy strikes before she can tell him how it turns out. Even worse, it strikes before the couple can resolve a certain matter of importance. Yusuke carries the burden of guilt for this, blaming himself for avoiding the conversation by driving around until very late. He finds Oto dead on the floor (brain hemorrhage) when he finally gets home.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Perhaps I ought to briefly talk about Yusuke\u2019s car, an old red Saab 900. It\u2019s his most prized possession. He can use it as a means of escape or return depending on the situation. It\u2019s also a place where he can be alone with his thoughts. Mostly, it\u2019s a place for him to listen to a cassette tape of his wife reading the Chekov play Uncle Vanya. He uses it to rehearse the lines of the title character, the last role he played before an on-stage breakdown during a show caused him to limit his involvement with theater to directing. In short, it\u2019s a safe place for the tortured artist.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Two years after his wife\u2019s death, Yusuke drives to Hiroshima where he\u2019s to direct an experimental production of Uncle Vanya. It will be performed in multiple languages- Japanese, Mandarin, Korean and Korean sign language (one of the actresses is a mute). He\u2019s to oversee six weeks of rehearsal followed by two weeks of performances. One of his actors, Koji (Takatsuki), was \u201cacquainted\u201d with Oto. Yusuke knows it, but avoids talking about it with the young actor who\u2019s dealing with a recent career setback. Instead, he casts him in the age-inappropriate role of the title character.<\/p>\n

\u00a0For insurance reasons, Yusuke is assigned a driver even though he doesn\u2019t want one. She\u2019s Misaki (Miura), a reserved young woman with a tragic backstory of her own. Like her passenger, she\u2019s disinclined to talk. At first, their interactions are limited to brief professional exchanges. As the weeks go by, they begin to open up to each other, sharing their pain and beginning the process of healing.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Based on the short story by Haruki Murakami (from his 2014 collection Men Without Women), there is a lot going on in Drive My Car<\/strong>. There\u2019s some drama about the mute actress (Yu-Rim), a former dancer with a secret. There are endless scenes of table read-throughs where Yusuke meticulously goes over every line of dialogue with the cast; he expects nothing less than perfection. There\u2019s plenty more, but I\u2019ll leave that for you to discover.<\/p>\n

\u00a0What else can I say about Drive My Car<\/strong> other than it\u2019s brilliant. There\u2019s not a single wrong note, misstep or flaw in the entire film. It\u2019s wonderfully acted by all, especially the two leads. They share something that goes beyond chemistry. It makes it easy to believe the spiritual connection between their characters. Their unspoken pain is absolutely palpable. Nishijima\u2019s portrayal of a grief-stricken individual who hides his pain with professionalism is pitch perfect. He\u2019s subdued rather than showy. That\u2019s exactly what\u2019s called for here. Miura turns in a sublime performance as a young woman running away from something that she can\u2019t get away from. It\u2019s always with her. It\u2019s only fitting that their story unfolds in Hiroshima, a city with a deep connection to trauma.<\/p>\n

\u00a0The cinematography by Hidetoshi Shinomiya is stunning. The long, repetitive shots of Yusuke\u2019s red car against the empty, endless roads indicate the spiritual journey he\u2019s on. The score by Eiko Ishibashi is in perfect synch with the dreamy tone of the film. That\u2019s actually the best way to describe Drive My Car<\/strong>; it\u2019s like a long dream that haunts as it mesmerizes. You\u2019ll be sorry when it\u2019s over, but it ends just where it should. It\u2019s one of the year\u2019s best films.\"\"<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Drive My Car (2021)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Janus Films\/Drama\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 RT: 179 minutes\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 No MPAA rating (sexual content\/references)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Director: Ryusuke Hamaguchi\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Screenplay: Ryusuke Hamaguchi and Takamasa Oe\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Music: Eiko Ishibashi\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cinematography: Hidetoshi Shinomiya\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Release date: November 24, 2021 (US)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cast: Hidetoshi Nishijima, Toko Miura, Masaki Okada, Reika Kirishima, Park Yu-Rim, Jin Dae-Yeon, Sonia Yuan, Ahn Hwitae, Perry Dizon, Satoko […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":6867,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[19,28],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6661","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-dramas","category-foreign"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/10\/Drive-My-Car-PIC.jpg?fit=620%2C348&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6661","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6661"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6661\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6869,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6661\/revisions\/6869"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6867"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6661"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6661"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6661"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}