A big guilty pleasure of mine gritty action noir. I've always felt a special thrill watching those tense action thrillers of the 80s and 90s (think Ronin, Heat, Thief) that rely on badass characters doing badass things without bothering with trifles like CGI and slow motion leaps through flocks of pigeons. Sadly, of late, maybe driven by the success of films like The Matrix Trilogy, there has been an increasing shift towards Michael Bay style effects-heavy outlandishness so improbable it would put ye olde Rajnideva to shame. This trend is wrong and of the Devil. Enter Nicolas Winding Refn's hyper-stylized Drive, a gloriously shot homage to the neon laced, synth scored action noir popularized by Michael Mann and Ridley Scott in the 80's. It doesn't fire on all cylinders (yes, the pun machine will be in overdrive today), but it does make for an intriguing ride.
The story, or in this case more appropriately the chassis, follows a stoic getaway driver (Ryan Gosling) who falls for his neighbor (Carey Mulligan) and gets embroiled in a dangerous game of deceit and double cross involving her felonious husband (Oscar Isaac) and a couple of very nasty gangsters (Albert Brooks and Ron Perlman). Of course, for Refn the story is merely an excuse to crank up the style and treat us to a lusciously colored canvas (trust me, LA has never looked this good on film) populated by dark characters, steadily rising levels of ultraviolence (definitely not for the weak stomached), and a couple of incredibly tense car chases.
In most respects, this is Refn's most conventional film to date (his other works include the gritty, utterly depressing Pusher trilogy, the bizarre and wonderful Bronson, and the murderously slow and ponderous Valhalla Rising), but much like his past work, Refn remains an adventurer, always curious how much he can bend the rules of a genre without breaking them. Drive, in that sense, is an experiment in how little a film can say while still managing to keep its audience interested. The idea is intriguing, no doubt, telling us almost nothing about any of the characters or their motivations outside of the absolute minimum required details (Gosling s character simply showed up one day 5-6 years ago looking for work , Carey Mulligan's husband was in jail and owed protection money to a bunch of gangsters). As a result, despite the actors' best efforts, it is a challenge to glean any meaning from the fairly generous amounts of dead air peppered throughout, including unnecessarily drawn out shots of Gosling driving around leisurely, and of Gosling and Mulligan staring blankly at each other. While this does make the car chases (all two of them) that much more tense, and the ratcheting levels of violence (including a man's face getting stomped in) that much more shocking, it does sometimes feel like unnecessary padding.
Part of the blame should go to the promotional materials for the film that promised a glorious homage to the quintessential car chase action movie (think Bullitt or The Italian Job), and which the fawning critical press fully lapped up (one critic going so far as to call it a fully imagined art house action flick ). So consider yourself warned, this movie is nowhere close to an action film. What it is, is a very intriguing effort at reimagining the noir genre. If you want just the car chases, wait for the DVD and fast forward to the good bits (trust me they are worth the effort).But if you want an experimental, minimalist noir, Drive is a ride worth hopping on.
The story, or in this case more appropriately the chassis, follows a stoic getaway driver (Ryan Gosling) who falls for his neighbor (Carey Mulligan) and gets embroiled in a dangerous game of deceit and double cross involving her felonious husband (Oscar Isaac) and a couple of very nasty gangsters (Albert Brooks and Ron Perlman). Of course, for Refn the story is merely an excuse to crank up the style and treat us to a lusciously colored canvas (trust me, LA has never looked this good on film) populated by dark characters, steadily rising levels of ultraviolence (definitely not for the weak stomached), and a couple of incredibly tense car chases.
In most respects, this is Refn's most conventional film to date (his other works include the gritty, utterly depressing Pusher trilogy, the bizarre and wonderful Bronson, and the murderously slow and ponderous Valhalla Rising), but much like his past work, Refn remains an adventurer, always curious how much he can bend the rules of a genre without breaking them. Drive, in that sense, is an experiment in how little a film can say while still managing to keep its audience interested. The idea is intriguing, no doubt, telling us almost nothing about any of the characters or their motivations outside of the absolute minimum required details (Gosling s character simply showed up one day 5-6 years ago looking for work , Carey Mulligan's husband was in jail and owed protection money to a bunch of gangsters). As a result, despite the actors' best efforts, it is a challenge to glean any meaning from the fairly generous amounts of dead air peppered throughout, including unnecessarily drawn out shots of Gosling driving around leisurely, and of Gosling and Mulligan staring blankly at each other. While this does make the car chases (all two of them) that much more tense, and the ratcheting levels of violence (including a man's face getting stomped in) that much more shocking, it does sometimes feel like unnecessary padding.
Part of the blame should go to the promotional materials for the film that promised a glorious homage to the quintessential car chase action movie (think Bullitt or The Italian Job), and which the fawning critical press
Posts
A shout out for the movie's soundtrack, a great 80's throwback, which helped set the leisurely yet dangerous pace of the movie
ReplyDeleteYou made the claim that LA hasn't look so good on film! Extraordinary claims require me to see the movie now. : )
ReplyDelete