Drive My Car

"Prize-winning festival favorite Ryusuke Hamaguchi returns with this somber drama about love and loss, based on a short story by Japanese author Haruki Murakami." --The Hollywood Reporter

"In this quiet masterpiece, Ryusuke Hamaguchi considers grief, love, work and the soul-sustaining, life-shaping power of art." --The New York Times

Yusuke Kafuku (Hidetoshi Nishijima) is a successful stage actor and director, married to the mysterious Oto (Reika Kirishima), a beautiful playwright with whom he shares a peaceful life, despite a deeply painful past. When Oto dies suddenly, Yûsuke is left with unanswered questions and regret over his inability to truly understand her--and his unwillingness to try.

Two years later, still struggling with Oto’s passing, Yusuke accepts an offer to direct a production of Uncle Vanya in Hiroshima, He drives to the posting in his beloved fire red Saab 900, where, upon arrival, to his surprise and disappointment, he learns that for legal reasons, he will be forced to let Misaki Watari (Toko Miura), a young chauffeur concealing a traumatic past of her own, drive his car. The Saab increasingly functions as an unexpected confessional for both driver and passenger.

As the premiere approaches, tensions amongst the cast and crew rise, and Yûsuke is forced to confront uncomfortable truths and unravel haunting mysteries left behind by his wife.

Drive My Car received Academy Award nominations in four categories: Best Picture, Best International Feature, Best Director, and Best Adapted Screenplay. Winner of the Best Screenplay award at the 2021 Cannes Film Festival, and adapted from Haruki Murakami’s short story of the same name, Drive My Car is an engrossing mystery, a parable of human connection, and a road movie traveling the path of love, loss, acceptance and peace.

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