In the mere opening moments of this French-Norwegian theatrical adaptation of Moby Dick, the line between humans and puppets blurs into an unsettling enigma, plunging audiences into a world where flesh and string intertwine. This disconcerting ambiguity sets the stage for a 90-minute odyssey that probes the very essence of existence: how does one navigate a life shrouded in uncertainty––or, in the narrator Ishmael’s words, “a half-known life”?

“Dear, the butter is too salty.”

Hope is when you have enough time

to lie around

waiting for your life to change.

Tic-tac-toe. Noughts and crosses. Xs and Os.

These are the names different people use to describe the same pencil-and-paper game.

A lot, yet very little happens in Wim Wenders’ Perfect Days, an affecting portrait of a public toilet janitor in Tokyo. Hirayama’s daily routine is almost perfectly clockwork: he wakes up to the sound of a neighbour sweeping, suits up in his “The Tokyo Toilet” uniform, and as he steps out of his door…he looks to the sky and heaves a happy sigh, regardless of how he is actually feeling.