Film Archive

Drive My Car

Horizons 2021 / Doraibu mai kâ / Japan 2021

When a sudden tragedy shakes your world, you welcome any kind of anchor. For Kafuku, a theater director, this is being able to drive his car every day, but then the theater assigns him a personal driver against his will. Even so, there is a positive side to this unexpected companion. Ryûsuke Hamaguchi’s gentle, obliquely told story rightly earned him the Best Screenplay award at Cannes.

Synopsis

When a sudden tragedy shakes your world, you welcome any fixed point. For theater director Kafuku, this is driving his car every day, during which he listens to cassettes of the latest play he is rehearsing. But when he begins to work on a new production, the theater assigns him a personal driver against his will. Even so, there is a positive side to this unexpected companion. Shortly after taking home the Grand Jury Prize from the Berlinale for Wheel of Fortune and Fantasy, Ryûsuke Hamaguchi enchanted audiences in Cannes, where his intimate, obliquely told story characterized by understated dialogues and silent but layered scenes rightly earned him the Best Screenplay award.

Martin Horyna

About the film

179 min / Color, DCP

Director Ryûsuke Hamaguchi / Screenplay Ryûsuke Hamaguchi, Oe Takamasa podle povídky / based on the short story by Haruki Murakami / Dir. of Photography Shinomiya Hidetoshi / Music Ishibashi Eiko / Editor Azusa Yamazaki / Art Director Seo Hyeonsun / Producer Yamamoto Teruhisa / Production C&I Entertainment Inc., Culture Entertainment Co., Ltd., Bitters End, Inc. / Cast Hidetoshi Nishijima, Toko Miura, Masaki Okada, Reika Kirishima, Park Yurim / Sales The Match Factory

About the director

Ryûsuke Hamaguchi (1978, Kanagawa, Japan). Selected filmography: Happy Hour (Happî awâ, 2015), Asako I & II (Netemo sametemo, 2018), Wheel of Fortune and Fantasy (Gûzen to sôzô, 2021), Drive My Car (Doraibu mai kâ, 2021).

Contacts

The Match Factory
Domstrasse 60, 50668, Cologne
Germany
Phone: +49 221 539 7090
E-mail: [email protected]