Going into this film I was not aware that it won Best Director at the Cannes Film Festival. Having seen the movie I am not at all surprised, but had you told me a film called "Drive", whose trailer shows nothing but cars, a kiss, and some general, jerky action moves, had been nominated for the Palme d'Or, I might have held your statement with a degree of distrust. Now I believe that had Terrence Malick's The Tree of Life (I keep referring back to this film, I know. It's just that good.) not come out this year, then Drive should have been the recipient of the top accolade. This is a masterful work of genre-blending, and a brilliant combination of art house and action for the above-average movie watcher.
After a breathtaking heist scene opening, Ryan Gosling's Driver is explained. His name is Driver because that is what he does--practically all that he does. By day he is a stunt driver for Hollywood films and an auto mechanic, and by night he serves as the getaway driver for small robberies. He doesn't need the money; his humble style of living shows that he does this for some other odd reason. Initially I was inclined to think that he was simply a victim of circumstance. His boss (Bryan Cranston) is a little man with a gimp who never had any luck, and spends his time with certain people where at least a little bit of luck might come in handy. I hoped that Driver fell into dealings with the mob because he was around them and was given no other choice.
The first thirty or so minutes would seem to support that theory--maybe even longer if you keep good faith in bad situations. He falls for a young woman who lives down the hall from him. Irene is played by the lovely Carey Mulligan (An Education), a girl with a troubled past, a son, and a husband soon to be out of prison. The brief time in which the two get to know each other is sparse on words, but words would get in the way. Their chemistry practically oozes out of the screen and we realize that we are watching deep, unconditional love. Both of these actors are young, but they are so far ahead of the others in their age range. Gosling is already proving to be the actor of this year, and Mulligan was rooked out of her Oscar in 2010. But I digress...
Irene's husband is let out of jail and quickly falls into debt with the mob. They threaten his family. Driver has become attached to the girl and her son dangerously fast, and he acts from the gut. He agrees to help Irene's husband get the money to pay his debt, on assurances that the family will be left alone. Like always he only agrees to drive, he carries no gun, and he gives the man five minutes to get the cash from a local pawnshop. But the heist goes terribly awry, and Driver soon finds himself with two dead bodies and a million dollars in cash. Irene's life is in terrible danger, and Driver realizes that the only way to save her is to go on the offensive.
This is not a car film as advertised. But it is a very tense action film with amazing sequences of intense violence and a pace that is methodical and unrelenting. This will disappoint some viewers going into the theater to get cheap thrills from action for the sake of action. They will find none of that here. Everything in this film happens for a reason, but is done with such a ferocity that hopefully those open to the experience will find something about it to embrace. The graphic nature of the violence will be a turnoff for some, but I found the hyper-stylization beautiful.
This film is one of those rare pieces which is able to take its influences from other films and genres without being restricted by them. The obvious 50's noir plot takes an unconventional twist by being soaked in 80's glam, saturated with purples, golds, and greens, and shot with the unconventional artistic eye that Kubrick and Tarantino would be proud of. This films imagery is powerful, and looks like pop art gone horribly, sublimely wrong.
The emotion of the first third of the film wanes some by the end. It has to, it is not a romance. But watch and remind yourself that the acts--the heinous acts--that Driver commits are all for a girl. And here we are brought back to my original thought of how he got mixed up in the business. He takes a life more than once, and he does it unflinchingly. Gosling is mesmerizing in this film, and I thought at first that I knew everything that he was thinking. By the end I had no idea who he was and he frightened me very much. Is he the good-natured guy that he is around Irene, or the savage killer he is before his enemies? Surely he can't be both. Is it right to sympathize with him? Perhaps the engine beneath that beautiful body is in need of some serious repair.
4/4
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