Meet the worst leading character in 2024 film. Nope. Not qualifying that. The worst. Kana (Yuumi Kawai) comes off initially as a spoiled brat, but she’s really so much worse … without being intentionally evil, which would give the character a small redemption.
This seems wrong. I could take evil. “Ok, evil-minded person, show me how you think so that I won’t be evil.” But Kana is just … passionless. And it’s beyond passionless for me because she doesn’t like books, movies, music, or anything one might share. She has no desire to work or go to college. She has a “career” as an assistant at a beauty salon, but there’s no investment in blood or soul in said job and she’s a flake. We might be looking at the best thing in her life and her greatest achievement, which is scary.
Oh, and she’s also unfaithful. The film wants to give her credit for finding joy in romance, but we all can’t help but notice that she’s shunned the steady guy who will put up with her shit for a new exciting guy. And she gave little thought to the process.
This is a portrait of a woman so selfish that the people around her chalk up her terrible behavior to bipolar disorder, but that’s incorrect; she’s just a perpetually bored selfish
asshole. On screen, she comes off as a spoiled brat. After “brat” the first notes I took were, “badly in need of a hobby.”
Desert of Namibia is a complete non-sequitur of a title. I think it was mentioned in the film once and applies to nothing. The film is ridiculously bloated at 137 minutes. There was precious little left on the cutting room floor for Desert. I was sick of this woman after ten minutes, and nothing changed beyond two hours. The extra-long scenes and lack of soundtrack makes one feel that this terrible person is actually in your life, which made me sad. I loathed this film, and if you saw it, you would as well.
There was once a young lady named Kana
Who never did anything she didn’t wanna
Sadly, that’s her life
A self-inflicted mental strife
Anything positive to contribute? She’s not gonna
Not Rated, 137 Minutes
Director: Yôko Yamanaka
Writer: Yôko Yamanaka
Genre: Characters you’ll hate
Type of being most likely to enjoy this film: Film festival officials looking to fill up a schedule
Type of being least likely to enjoy this film: Anyone who has seen the film
