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![]() last life in the universe interview
Director Pen-Ek Ratanaruang gets moody. Last Life In The Universe, with its unreliable narrative, quirky visual clues and sumptuous cinematography, is all very David Lynch. Or, more accurately, this cinematic play on existential thought, which starts off with Kenji (Japanese legend Tadanobu Asano) revealing that in three hours time he will have committed suicide, is like David Lynch being given a rub down by a ladyboy on a Thai Beach: wondrous and bizarre in equal measure. ![]() It’s a switch to a more melancholic tempo for director Pen-Ek Ratanaruang, who had previously displayed a more comedic sensibility in Monrak Transistor and 6ixtynin9. Suffering from nicotine withdrawal on a beach at the Venice Film Festival, the director reveals that this change has been brought about by a new perspective on life, love and everything: “Right after I made my second film, I had to travel to a lot of festivals. At the same time I was making a lot of TV commercials and this made me very tired. We have so many choices today, with emails and cable TV, that it seems life was so much simpler 20 years ago. At a dinner party a friend of mine said, ‘Maybe we should all die now, it seems so much more relaxing.’” The theme is picked up in Last Life through the travails of Kenji, an obsessive compulsive who finds himself yearning to escape life through death. “Death is something that I think about constantly,” reveals Pen-Ek. “You have to understand that in the Buddhist Way, death is part of life and it is not the end of life. So actually death is like taking a nap.” ![]() The complicated narrative flips back and forth, revealing a fantastical love story at the movie’s heart. Pen-Ek says, “I’m a big believer in romance. Otherwise we can’t live.” And in Last Life, Pen-Ek vividly explores this sentiment.
Kaleem Aftab
Last Life In The Universe, on selected release 30 July 04.
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