RIFLE RANGE BOY

Drive My Car (Japanese; 2021) Director: Ryusuke Hamaguchi Based on Short Story by Haruki Murakami I have not read any of Murakami's works; I guess I should. His body of work is said to reflect the deep, dark corners of human consciousness. After watching this highly engaging movie, I think I should engage time to appreciate his writings. As in all good movies, the viewers are clueless for a good one hour into the film. I was wondering where the story was going. Why was the protagonist, Kafuku, a theatre actor, who was acting in 'Waiting for Godot', keeps driving around? Why did he not react when he caught his wife, Oto, sleeping with another man? What is this about Oto and telling stories? Then there is the history of a dead child. And then the wife dies too. Two years on, Kafuku is on a directing stint in Hiroshima. The company insists that they hire a chauffeur for him to drive his 1987 Saab Turbo. The chauffeur, Misaki, a young 20 something woman, seems to carry a massiv...

Dora (Tamil, 2017) Most Hindus believe that our physical bodies are just vessels for the Atma (soul). The Atma is eternal. It moves from births to births to finish unfinished business and to re-pay unsettled dues. Everything happens for a reason, and the reason is this. Nothing happens by mere chance or at random for nothing. Every flutter of a butterfly wing and every whiff of the wind that regenerates takes place in a pre-determined fashion. But then that would nullify the role of free will in deciding the course of our lives or it our free will also pre-determined. I think Avicenna incurred the ire of his contemporaries when he posited that God is too great to be worried about the nitty-gritty details of things that happen but decides on things seen at a higher level. This must be the basis of this movie. The soul of a dog (Dora) goes into a car to avenge the death of its owner. Nayanthara is the kick-ass protagonist which unknowingly becomes the...