tccandler

Hamaguchi Ryusuke also directed one of the best films of 2021 with "Drive My Car". In this cinematic triptych, he explores the nature of fidelity, memory and complex relationships. The first of the three pieces is riveting conversation and I loved it. The other two are nice, but perhaps a little too distant to be fully grasped. As with all of his films, the performances are key, as his stoic camera observes quietly.

Halle Berry writes and stars in this movie about an alcoholic MMA fighter trying to grasp redemption after throwing in the towel years earlier. This is a basic "Rocky" rip-off with some decent performances and generally realistic fight sequences. The disappointment comes with Berry's direction. The films lacks a cinematic touch. It is routine and mundane... never amounting to anything more than a run-of-the-mill TV movie.

A poetic masterclass in acting. Hamaguchi Ryusuke directs this quietly observational film about a man who loses his wife, first to infidelity and then to a sudden fatal medical condition. The story effortlessly follows him trying to come to terms with those events, while being driven, in his own car, back and forth to theater rehearsals by a mysterious female driver, who has a haunting past of her own.