Wheel of Fortune and Fantasy (2021)
Written and
Directed by: Ryusuke Hamaguchi
Won the Silver Bear Grand Jury Prize at the Berlin International Film Festival
From the
director of the Oscar winning film, ‘Drive My Car’ came another film in the
same year. And even this film did a good run in the festival circuits. Both the
films deal with the intricacies of modern relationships. I’d say that I enjoyed
this film more than Drive My Car. This film is an anthology of three stories –
and all the stories have very minimalist, simple setups – mostly told through
conversations. The first story is a simple story about how a girl meets her
best friend’s ex. The premise is extremely simple, but what he does with this
is mind-blowing. This premise could lead to a comedy of errors, it could be a
slice of life comedy, or a simple rom-com too. But this film goes into deeper
territories. It talks about different shit people do in relationships ranging from
self-sabotaging acts to how people deliberately hurt the ones that they love.
For me, the entire stretch of conversation at the office was masterful writing.
The second
story is also in a very interesting space – it’s simple on the outside, but if
you go within, it plays with a lot of ideas like revenge, goes a bit into
territories of voyeurism, and I absolutely loved how the story flips. Even in
this story, the entire stretch of a scene is classy writing – set in one room,
two people and it’s about 20 minutes and it explores so much of the human
condition within relationships. I could sense a lot of unflinching honesty in
the writing. The last story, was the least favorite of all for me. I liked the
intensity of the feelings the characters were carrying, but somehow it didn’t
translate to me as much. I’m usually not that much of a fan of anthologies –
but I absolutely enjoyed watching this film, simply because how gripping the
writing is, irrespective of its extremely simple setups.
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