“Drive”
Written by Hossein Amini based on the book by James Sallis; Directed by Nicolas Winding Refn. Stars: Ryan Gossling, Carrie Mulligan, Bryan Cranston and Albert Brooks. Story: A Hollywood stunt performer who moonlights as a wheelman discovers that a contract has been put on him after a heist gone wrong.
Seen by Lars & Adam, September 18, 2011
LARS:
It’s nice that there may now be two Danish directors that people know. Many moviegoers have heard about Lars von Trier by now, if only because his antics are often more newsworthy than his movies (which I generally love to hate). Nicolas Winding Refn is cursed with one of those Danish names that don’t exactly roll off the tongue of anyone outside of Scandinavia, so he just has to work the harder to get the name recognition that he certainly is beginning to deserve.
Refn made waves in Denmark in 1995 when he dropped out of film school in his first semester to direct “Pusher”, which went on to become a massive blockbuster in Denmark. He was 25 years old. Over the next decade, Refn tried his hand at various other films, but none replicated the success of “Pusher”, so almost a decade later he shot two sequels that were not as well received. At that point I had written him off as a wunderkind, who was doomed never to repeat his early success (in related news, “Citizen Kane” came out on Blu-Ray this week. Buy it.). But then in 2008, Refn directed “Bronson” (which is available on Netflix Streaming) and it looked like he was back on track to real greatness. Featuring a blistering performance by Tom Hardy as the British convict ‘Charles Bronson’ who has spent the last 34 years in prison, “Bronson” was tough as nails and poetic at the same time. So when the buzz around “Drive” began to surface at the Cannes Film Festival, I was really looking forward to seeing where Refn was going this time around.
“Drive” is not for the squeamish. The use of violence as the last resort or just as a substitute for communication has always been one of Refn’s trademarks and this movie is no exception. There’s a scene with a guy getting his face kicked in that has only been bested in pure gruesomeness by Gaspar Noe in his notorious movie “Irreversible”. “Drive” has a tension to it that you know will eventually be released somehow. And after a while you realize how.
It is in many ways a timeless story. It could just as easily and plausibly have been set in the 1940s and have been shot as a pulpy film noir in the 1950s. “Drive” is based on the eponymous book by James Sallis that opens with the lines, “I drive. That’s what I do. All I do.” Those lines influence Ryan Gosling’s surprisingly tough and sensitive performance. I’ve sung Gosling’s praise on this blog a number of times before, but I frankly never envisioned him as a vengeful angel of death, all bulked up and dangerous to mess with. But here he pulls of a menace that combines the quiet of Clint Eastwood’s Man With No Name with a dose of Steve McQueen in his prime coolness. He remains the best actor of his generation and that he has an awesome band, Dead Man’s Bones, as well just makes him that much easier to hate. The rest of the cast do wonderful work with their relatively limited screen time, especially Albert Brooks, who stands out as the head bad guy. Isn’t it funny how comedians always make excellent villains? Maybe it’s the seething insecurity of the stand-up comedian that lurks right below the surface that they tap into? Carey Mulligan has little to do other than be cute enough to fall in love with, and she pulls that off with no trouble at all.
Refn sets the film in the LA that the movies rarely show; a suburbia of run-down apartment blocks and faded strip malls, the film feels like the work of a young Michael Mann. Refn deservedly won Best Director in Cannes for “Drive” and his sense of pacing as well as the muted color scheme makes the film stand out and feel out of time in the best possible way.
Apparently, Refn and Gosling have a bit of a bromance going on. They are also collaborating on Refn’s next film that takes place in the world of Thai boxing. I have a sneaky suspicion it’ll be on the violent side.
ADAM:
I walked into “Drive” with high expectations based on the bits and pieces of reviews that had managed to get into my head, despite attempts to ignore them. I had no idea that I’d see what, for me, was the second coming of the young Michael Mann who I so love so dearly. There was no one like the early Mann to set a cruel mood, to pace and musically score a tension-filled scene, to choreograph a shootout with realism, to trivialize violence for a character, yet give it so much weight and meaning. “Thief,” “Manhunter,” and “Heat” are likely his most quintessential action, crime films. He spread his wings with “Last of the Mohicans” and had quite a misstep with “Public Enemies,” but he’s also a huge influence on other younger, big filmmakers of various genres: Michael Bay of big action, Brett Rattner of action comedy, and David Fincher, of dark drama.
I wonder if Mann’s films influenced Nicolas Winding Refn, director of “Drive.” Because Refn’s telling of the story (adapted from James Sallis’ book) hits all the right notes and possesses perfect pacing; tender in spots, haunting and brutal in others. Like the best engrossing, contained films, “Drive” pulls us into the seedy underbelly of Los Angeles, and the rest of the world seems to drop away. Characters are well-developed, even if they have minimal screen time. Performances are first rate, particularly Ryan Gosling, Bryan Cranston and Albert Brooks, as the heavy.
This is the type of film that would’ve been made in the early seventies to moderate success and would become a cult classic. In fact, the closest a film has come to telling a story like this in the past twenty years was probably “Payback,” starring Mel Gibson. “Payback” was inspired by the 1967 film “Point Blank,” written by Richard Stark — a pseudonym for Donald E. Westlake, who also wrote “The Grifters,” “The Hot Rock,” and many great novels. I enjoyed this so much and want anyone who goes to make as much discovery personally as possible, so I won’t say more other than if you enjoy the gruesome reality that is the world of crime and the characters who inhabit it, “Drive” is for you.
