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Last Life in the Universe
Thnilnncl/Nethei Inncls/Homj Koncj/United Kingdom 2003
Kenji, who works as a librarian at the Japanese Cultural Centre in present-day Bangkok, entertains suicidal fantasies. As he is about to hang himself, his brother, who is on the run, arrives with a mysterious package and moves in. Later, Kenji's brother brings an associate back to the apartment. The man shoots dead Kenji's brother, and is in turn killed by Kenji, who has opened his brother's package to discover a gun inside. Kenji is perched on a bridge, preparing to throw himself into the river below. Behind him, a teenage girl named Nid, whom Kenji has seen earlier in the library, gets out of her sister's car and is mown down. Kenji accompanies Nid's sister Noi to the hospital, where Nid dies.
Kenji and Noi go back to Noi's house, where they stay for the next few days. The pair gradually grow closer, despite the threats of Noi's ex-boyfriend, who attacks Noi before Kenji intervenes. Eventually it is time for Noi to leave for her studies in Osaka. Travelling in the opposite direction are three yakuzas hunting Kenji's brother. At Kenji's apartment, they find and kill Noi's ex-boyfriend, who had come looking for Kenji. Kenji himself, who was in the bathroom when the yakuzas arrived, is last seen handcuffed in a police interview room, speculating on Noi's new life.
For his fourth feature, Last Life in the Universe, the Thai director Pen-Ek Ratanaruang attempts to tell in abstract terms what could...