Foreign Films at the Oscars: Drive My Car, Parallel Mothers, The Worst Person in the World

Following the #OscarsSoWhite controversy, the Academy of Motion Pictures & Sciences has increasingly tried to diversify its membership, which has resulted in more foreign films breaking out of the Best Foreign Film silo and showing up as awards contenders in other categories. This year, there are three such films, and I watched them all to see if the hype was to be believed. The answer is Yes, No, and Somewhat.

The Worst Person in the World: I went into this movie with too-high expectations. It was getting rave reviews across the board and absolutely no one seemed to have a bad word to say. Well, let me be the contrarian. While I think the lead actress, Renate Reinsve, is sublime and deserves the accolades she has been receiving, I fail to understand why people thought this movie was so captivating and had anything novel to say. And perhaps the argument is that this movie is not saying anything novel, but represents how people behave in their twenties. To which I say, this was certainly not my experience in my twenties, so I can't love this movie on that level either.

We follow Julie (Reinsve), a young Norwegian medical student (she does not stay a medical student for long, perhaps the only connection I felt to her), who is trying to find herself and what she wants to do with her life. However, instead of actual soul-searching, she falls into a relationship with an older man. This is subsequently a movie about what happens with that relationship and the various questions and troubles that spring from it. At no point in this film does Julie appear to have any female friends or a life outside of her boyfriend. This movie is nominated for Best Original Screenplay, and I can see why - it has a very clever structure where it is set up in "Chapters" complete with a "Prologue" and "Epilogue" that give it a very literary feel. The chapter titles can sometimes give funny hints to what is about to transpire or ominously reveal impending doom. But this is a movie that emphatically doesn't pass the Bechdel test and is so obviously written by two men (Eskil Vogt and Joachim Trier, who is also the movie's director). 

Reinsve is a wonderful actress, and there's one scene in particular where she's walking down a road, realizing that she might not be fully happy with her relationship, and her face crumples up in a very subtle fashion that made me tear up. But by and large, she is so underserved by this script. This is yet another example of male screenwriters thinking they know exactly how women act and feel and live their lives (there's also a subplot about her complicated daddy issues, but almost no time dedicated to her relationship with her attentive mother - spare me). And yes, there is a very funny moment in the movie where an older man mansplains what mansplaining means, but it is sort of trite and meta and merely showcases again that this woman needs more women in her life. Ultimately, I do think this movie highlights a terrible path that many women go down when they are younger, where they waste a decade before they realize they need to find themselves before they find a partner. But the film simply could not move me, except to mild annoyance. It's beautifully shot with some inventive cinematic sequences, and is certainly a great writing exercise; so if you want to watch a technically interesting movie and/or get an introduction to Oslo, go for it. But if you want something that feels emotionally resonant and true, ugh. Don't bother.

Drive My Car: From Japanese director Ryasuke Hamaguchi (who adapted this screenplay with Takamasa Oe from a short story by Haruki Murakami), this movie is a meditative three-hour character study that has a lot of interesting and beautiful ideas but will take as much time as it wants to get there. Listen, I grew up on Bollywood films, so I'm no stranger to long movies, but this movie was too slow for me and I couldn't enjoy it as much as I wanted to. 

This is a story about Yusuke (Hidetoshi Nishijima), a theater actor and director, who is married to a screenwriter, Oto (Reika Kirishima). We get a glimpse of their marriage, but when Oto suddenly dies, we then follow Yusuke's journey two years later when he is directing a production of Uncle Vanya and still coming to terms with his grief and loneliness. We meet a whole cast of characters involved in this play, as well as the wonderful Misaki (Toko Miura), a young woman who has been tasked with driving Yusuke to and from rehearsals every day. 

This movie is a mood. You need to give yourself up to the vibes and let them wash over you, almost as if you are in the backseat of a car and have no control of where you're headed. It has so many fascinating elements - the theater production is captivating, and thanks to this movie, I now know that Korean Sign Language is absolutely gorgeous to behold. Every actor is doing phenomenal work, and you don't need any subtitles to fully understand the impact of their emotions. But I lacked the patience for this movie. Perhaps if you watch it on streaming and give yourself breaks in between, you can fully absorb it without being worn down by its languid pace. I do think it is well worth a viewing, but you will need to ensure you are in the right frame of mind for this drive. 

Parallel Mothers: Written and directed by Pedro Almodovar, this movie was my favorite of the bunch. And of course, it isn't even nominated for Best Foreign Film, but instead for Best Original Score for Alberto Iglesias and Best Actress for Penelope Cruz. I can't quibble with those nominations since I thought both Cruz and the score were outstanding, but man, apparently I just don't have the same taste as the Academy when it comes to what deserves to be a Best Foreign Film. I'm gonna pull the sexism card and say that it's because this is a movie about two women and barely contains any men.

I don't want to give away any of the plot - when I saw trailers for this film, I had no idea what to expect, and after watching it, I'm so glad I went in cold. I let this story unfold and found myself constantly surprised and a little unnerved by its twists and turns. I also immediately felt like I needed to be watching more Almodovar movies. The word I keep coming back to when trying to describe how this movie felt is Hitchcockian. It is weirdly suspenseful and you can never quite predict what Cruz's character might be thinking or doing at any given time. And her co-lead, Milena Smit, turns in just as dazzling a performance. Aesthetically, the film is a marvel, filled with gorgeous colors and captivating production design that keep your eyes engaged throughout, and that score keep niggling at you, contributing to that overall wariness you feel about how things are going down.

This is a fantastic movie that has a lot to say about female friendship, motherhood, love, and surprisingly, Spanish history. You might think you're getting an intense character study, but also be prepared for some knowledge about Spain's fascist past. Almodovar takes an intimate and specific story and imbues it with universal meaning, and I found myself captivated throughout. So watch it. In my opinion, it's a perfect showcase of what Foreign Films do best.