A 3-hour long runtime is always intimidating, but every second of this felt necessary. It’s slow, but it doesn’t drag. Instead the tempo and stillness allow you to sit with these wonderfully complicated and wounded characters, both as a spectator to their stories and difficulties and as a part of the film yourself. Much like Takatsuki’s monologue about loving yourself before loving someone else, a good story is primarily about your subjective relationship with it, and only secondarily about its objective characters and plots. A good movie is introspective and connects to parts of your own soul and psyche by way of someone else’s (characters, director, writer). And Drive My Car is a really good movie.

I know why some people (those expecting a new Parasite?) would think it's slow and nothing happens but I was invested in these characters, so it didn't drag for me. Loved it.

There is an almost masochistic appreciation of pain, in the way of listening to someone who is absent. "The text questions you", says Kafuku, you have to give in to it, as Sonia affirms in "Uncle Vanya": "What is going to be done!... You have to live!". Finding a safety net in Chekhov's work, letting the characters build at their own pace, the film wins as the driver's background takes over the plot.

This movie awed me with its beautiful cinematography, which is used not only to show pretty imagery, but I feel it was used mostly to give us time to reflect on what was just said by the dialogue and internalize it, sometimes imagery was used to convey a specific feeling throughout the movie, for example through most of the runtime, during driving scenes, we see the street as if we were in the back seat looking through the back window of the car, contemplating the past, but at the end of the movie, for the first time, we see the street from the driver's point of view, as if looking to our future, and this is just something I found in my 1st watch through.


With almost 3 hours of run time, I found myself entranced in some parts and wondering when it was going to end in others, it is a slow burn, but I found it amazing how much it made me reflect not only on the characters but on myself as well, if I had to describe it in a phrase it would be: an autoscopic view of our past and our expectations for life

To me It was just so long, forgettable and boring.

omg long movie but good tho. feels like an endless journey with keanu reeves whispering about life xddd

Existential angst without the seppuku.

Like eating adult cereal when you're a teen and sad there isn't a prize in the box.

I don't think there will ever be a better adaptation of the novel. simply amazing.

It's a pity that "Drive My Car" is not selling well in its home country, but it's also true that both the style and acting are the exact opposite of what Japanese audiences are used to. While the dialogues and situations tend to feel a little cold and artificial, I found the characters' reactions strangely realistic. Their lack of "action" is not what you would expect from a movie, but especially in Japan, that's what would most likely happen in real life.

Not much happens during the course of the film's three hours, but it felt like the director purposely gave us time to think, put the pieces together and relate to our own experiences in between each scene, just like the main character during his car rides back and forth the theater. I wouldn't date to call it slow cinema, but you get the idea. People who lived long enough to have regrets and skeletons in the closet will probably enjoy it.

one hell of a long movie but honestly worth it,
the long scenes, with and without silence gave this movie something i can't describe, i can't put into words, but anyway, i loved the silent scenes so much

Had to deduct 1 Point cos Jaun-Claude Van Damme wasn't in the cast.