Every now and then, every so often, you just have to watch a film that makes you smile and makes you happy. “The World’s Fastest Indian” is the surefire antidote for depression or cynicism. Anderson’s film, in the spirit of coming of age stories like “Harry and Tonto” and “The Straight Story”, evolves from a story of friendship, then of a small town, then of an old man refusing to lay down and die, to a road flick, and then to an underdog sports film. And it’s just such a treat to watch everything unfold with Burt Munro played with such genuine charm by Hopkins.
“Maybe there isn’t a design”, the cleaner examines to her audience, but then maybe there is. Maybe there’s a god and this is all a large plan, but maybe there isn’t and this all just random, then what of our existence and how we can leaves traces of ourselves long after we’ve died? “It doesn’t end when we’ve died”, the cleaner declares. Shirley Henderson gives a fascinating performance as “the cleaner” an entity who hovers around everyone in their household and cleans and wipes up after them and could very well be a ghost because she’s just a watcher.
