OSCARS 2022: Drive My Car (2021)

It seems like “Parasite” really might have been a game changer. The first non-English language film to win Best Picture seems to have opened Academy voters’ eyes to Asian cinema. This year, another Eastern film would surprisingly break through with the voters. “Drive My Car” was widely expected to earn a Best International Picture nomination. It surprisingly grabbed a Best Picture, a Best Director, and a Best Adapted Screenplay nomination as well. It is the first time a Japanese film has been nominated for Best Picture and Best Adapted Screenplay. Ryusuke Hamaguchi is only the third Japanese man to be nominated for Best Director, joining a small club previously occupied only by Akita Kurosawa and Hiroshi Teshigehara. Regardless of whether the film wins anything next month, it’s already made history. 

Yūsuke Kafuku is an acclaimed stage actor and director, famous for putting on multilingual productions of the Russian classic. His wife, Oto, is a screenwriter who shares her ideas with him after sex. She also helps him practice his lines by recording them on cassette, which he listens to during long drives. Despite their love, he discovers Oto is having an affair. She unexpectedly dies of a brain embolism shortly afterwards, wrecking Kafuku’s ability to focus on his work. Two years later, he takes a job at a university, helping workshop a multilingual production of “Uncle Vanya.” The school insists he is giving a driver, in the form of the very quiet Watari. As the production goes on, Kafuku will grow closer to his driver, his cast, and come to struggle with the past. 

Each and every one of us carries around some degree of grief. We all grapple with unfinished business, with a lack of closure from someone who meant something dear to us. “Drive My Car” is all about this uncertain, heavy feeling. Yūsuke still listens to the recording of his late wife in the car, long after she has passed. He still blames himself for her death. This is far from the only grief in his life, as he lost a daughter when she was only four years old. When he meets Watari, he soon discovers they have this in common. Her abusive and mentally ill mother died in a landslide when she was a young girl. The complicated feelings around this incident informs everything she's done in her life since then. It's fitting that so much of “Drive My Car” is concerned with driving and travel. This is a story all about the weight of the past and slowly, but surely, learning to move on from it. 

As much as the death of his wife wounds him still, Yūsuke is also conflicted over the memory of her infidelity. The two of them had such an intimate relationship, rooted in sexuality and creativity, that it seems impossible that there was things about her he didn't know. Yet, a stunning monologue from half-way through the movie argues, we can never really know everything about some one. This links to the premise of the multilingual plays Yūsuke organizes. The actors are all telling the same story but none of them are speaking the same language. Japanese, Cantonese, English, and Korean Sign Language are all used to perform the material. They only have an idea of what everyone else is saying. This connects with a later moment, when the theater troupe are rehearsing out in the park and two of the actors share a special moment, their backs to the rest of the group. We all have secrets and, no matter how close we may be to our lovers or family, they only have a small percentage of everything we are. 

If it wasn't obvious, “Drive My Car” left me in a real contemplative, thoughtful mood. That's the kind of effect a movie like this has on you. Unfolding over a lofty three hour runtime, the film slowly draws you in with its meditative pacing. The title credits aren't even dropped on you until the forty minute mark, to give you an idea of how deliberately paced out things are here. Yet, as slow as “Drive My Car” is, it never comes off as boring. As you watch the actors workshop go about their business, or far-off images of Watari's car driving through the countryside, you are lulled into a thoughtful, comfortable place. There's something serene about this motion picture, its patient approach and frequently lovely cinematography allowing you to slowly warm up to the melancholy – but ultimately peaceful – emotions its story summons.

The performances also match this insightful atmosphere. Hideotoshi Nishijima is quiet throughout long stretches of “Drive My Car.” The only time he ever raises his voice is when he's on-stage, acting. Throughout most of the movie, he is thoroughly used to living with his grief. He's been left numb by it, the miles he's traveled with it plain on his face. When he starts to crack up, that's when you know things have gotten really serious. If Nishijima's  Yūsuke is barely functioning under the strain of his pain, Tōko Miura has been rendered almost catatonic by it. Watching her layers of muted protection slowly slip away, revealing the wounded child within, is another touching process. Park Yu-rim also gives an extraordinary performance as Lee Yoo-na, a mute actress who communicates via sign language. Her poetic hand gestures during the penultimate scene is the perfect emotional climax for this story.

One must also shout-out the red two-door Saab 900 that is driven all throughout the movie. Rarely has an automobile done as much heavy-lifting as this one has. “Drive My Car's” intimidating run time and meditative pace will not be to everyone's taste. Yet I found the film to be totally compelling all throughout. I'm glad to see that something like this, obviously a bit outside the comfort zone of your stereotypical Academy voter, has its chance at the top category of the night. “Drive My Car” is touching, quietly funny, and grapples with some of the biggest questions we can ask about life. [8/10]