Quebec cinephiles will finally have the opportunity to see this film whose notoriety has continued to grow since the start of the awards season. Observers believe that Drive My Car could very well be cited at the Oscars in other categories than that devoted to the best international film.
Posted at 8:30 a.m.
In this admirably staged drama, where the theme of disappearance finds a wonderful echo in the theater of Anton Chekhov, filmmaker Ryûsuke Hamaguchi (Wheel of Fortune and Fantasy) puts forward a cinema as subtle as poignant, also gratified with a splendid visual invoice.
Drawing its source from a short story by Haruki Murakami, the story of Drive My Car is based on the search for meaning in which Yusuke (Hidetoshi Nashijima, magnificent), an actor and theater director who suffers from the sudden and mysterious departure of his wife, a playwright with whom he was spinning the perfect love, even if infidelities have sometimes been part of the couple’s journey.
So he accepts the invitation made to him by a theater in Hiroshima to go there in residence to stage an international and multilingual version ofUncle Vanya, a play in which he could easily play the main character himself, which he nevertheless refuses to do. The actor he chooses for the role is Japanese, but the cast also includes actors speaking Korean, English, as well as sign language.
The title of the film evokes the presence of a young driver, hired to drive Yusuke on all his trips, the production refusing, for a question of insurance, that the director drives his own car himself. With this young woman, named Misaki (Tokô Miura), the forties will have long existential conversations on the road, aboard the SAAB 900 of which Yusuke takes great care, and to which he holds like the apple of his eye.
A fascinating intimate fresco
There is nothing really spectacular during the three hour screening, however, Drive My Car is traversed by grace from beginning to end. The superbly sensual first part of the film is devoted to the relationship between Yusuke and Oto, his adored wife (Reika Kirishima), which captivates the attention so much that we forget the absence of the opening credits. This indeed appears after about forty minutes. All the rest of the story will explore how Yusuke will have to deal with this unexpected disappearance, all the more disturbing as it comes at a time when the couple had to settle a serious question, which will thus remain unresolved.
PHOTO PROVIDED BY EYESTEELFILM
Hidetoshi Nishijima is the headliner of Drive My Car (drive my chariot), a film by Ryūsuke Hamaguchi.
The process of theatrical creation is of course part of Yusuke’s way of living his mourning, but it is also by tirelessly re-listening, morning and evening in the car, to a recording with all the lines of the play, that a link will be established with the driver who, over the days, will confide in him. Also focusing attentively on the peripheral characters of this story – the actors in the play in particular –, Ryûsuke Hamaguchi thus orchestrates a fascinating intimate fresco, which takes the time to unfold, to end in a very fine psychological study, extremely well controlled.
Winner of the best screenplay prize at the Cannes Film Festival last year (several festival-goers were expecting it higher up the list), Drive My Car is a film from which a gentle melancholy emanates, combined with a sensitive and mature reflection on the depth of a feeling of love. Without a doubt one of the most beautiful cinematographic works that we have seen in 2021.
Drive My Car hits theaters in the original version with French subtitles (under the title drive my chariot) from February 7.
Drama
Drive My Car (V.F.: drive my chariot)
Ryusuke Hamaguchi
With Hidetoshi Nishijima, Toko Miura, Reika Kirishima
2:59