Drive

Drive (2011)

Director: Nicolas Winding Refn

Cast: Ryan Gosling, Bryan Cranston, Albert Brooks, Ron Perlman, Catherine Hendricks, Carey Mulligan

Drive's opening scene is intended as a promise of great excitement to come. Our hero, an unnamed stunt car driver played by Ryan Gosling, waits in a parking lot for two thieves whom are paying him to drive them away from the scene of a crime. He's obviously super sick at what he does-- something we know even before see the movie-- veering and swerving and halting and slowing as the po' are close on their tails. The scene ends with him jetting it to a car garage and subtly sneaking away, molding into a crowd of basketball enthusiasts. 

This scene is not nearly exciting as its makers want us to believe. No car accidents, no brushes of death with innocent bystanders, no shoot off, no irony or smirks or close-ups of brake-slamming can be found. That being said, the remainder of the film achieves something much more intriguing than the hyped suspense and violence which drew so many people to the theaters last fall.

Namely, Drive is impressive with its sustained momentum and wonderful characters. In an early scene, The Stuntman establishes a legitimate professional relationship with his employer Shannon, played by Bryan Cranston, who relishes giving his character a distinguishable and unique personality despite Shannon's lackluster dialogue. Albert Brooks is similarly unrecognizable as the sinister and indomitable crime boss Bernie, and Ron Perlman is perfect as violent and impetuous Jewish gangster, Nino.  Catherine Hendricks is wonderfully suited for her brief role, and of course, Ryan Gosling   becomes subsumed in his character's enigmatic demeanor, which deliberately calls for non- expression,  someone who remains an enigma until the final frame, a solitary and reserved figure of justice, with some seriously violent skills under his belt.

The end of Drive reveals so much of the film's hidden elements that it requires a couple viewers to understand its purpose. The Stuntman is revealed to be the most fearsome of this lot of gangsters. He is never afraid and his life is never in jeopardy, even though we thought it was the entire time. In this way, the film is one big joke on the audience. Whether he's wielding a car, a mask, a hammer, a stomping foot, or a knife, he's impenetrable, and so the irony is that, by the end, we realize that he was going to own these guys no matter what.

That being said, this original premise does not make up for the fact that the central crux, a love story between him and his neighbor Irene (Carey Mulligan) fails on every level. Mulligan is so conspicuously miscast and so incompetent with the role that I am shocked no one nixed the idea. First of all, her character was meant to be Hispanic, so the obvious prejudice of not carrying through with finding a Hispanic actress is distracting and insulting. Coupled with this is the problem that Mulligan presents Irene as thoughtful, dead-pan, and non-emotional, even when Gosling's hero inflicts vengeance and abrupt violence. All the other characters are highly animated, the antithesis of the Stuntman, so why isn't Irene? Why does he fall for her anyway? The scenes in which they dote on each other are forced and disingenuous. If the film is meant to be neo noir, as its press suggests, than shouldn't the female lead be seductive and intriguing? It is increasingly apparent that actresses today can not be beautiful and sexy and still gain serious roles (check out Mulligan playing Daisy in Gatsby, or Emma Stone in every role she's ever been in, like Jonah Hill's love interest once upon a time). This consistency makes the decision not to cast a Hispanic actress even more inexcusable.  

And such a critical and unforgivable mistake makes Drive a great B movie that will be forgetten in ten years, when it could have been a 21st century classic.

B