Post date: Jun 5, 2012 4:58:10 PM
I watched Drive last night after Mike Dawson mentioned on the podcast that it was available on Netflix. As it has been a source of such great controversy on the show, I wanted to check it out. Critics love it, Bald Bryan likes it, Adam hates it, and generally it seems to be a line in the sand where anyone who watches it is on one side or the other. Dawson was with Team Adam. I like to think I went in with an open mind since although I agree with a lot of what Adam says, he's certainly not infallible. After all, he thinks Spaceballs sucks and I'm firmly on Team Bald Bryan on that one. Also, from In Fifty Years We'll All Be Chicks there was a section on movies. I tried to take the Aceman's advice on a few movies and watched Papillon (extremely bored) and Lost in America (don't think I laughed once), so it certainly wasn't a given that I'd end up hating Drive. Adam likes to pick apart movies and wonder why for example someone who is a professional driver lives in a crummy apartment. In most cases I do my best to just buy into the story. I know nothing about cars and don't care to, so I wasn't going to pick up on subtle car inaccuracies such as Bryan Cranston commenting on tire tread when they should be slicks. Just like Adam's complaint about the movie Road Trip incorrectly reporting the weight of a car, not going to ruin it for me...in fact, I love that movie for what it is...a dumb comedy:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xZOg8bzVT5s
In short, I have to agree whole-heartedly with Adam on Drive though. This is not a great movie and not even what I would consider a good movie. I have no idea how it has a 90+ rating on Rotten Tomatoes. I would not recommend it or ever consider voluntarily watching it again. I don't even know what the hell that was. In about 110 minutes, there may have been 30 minutes of actual movie story. The rest was slow, long drawn-out shots of the characters doing absolutely nothing while soft, ghostly music plays. Nothing was happening, nobody was talking...just the soft whir of music and attempted imagery. It was trying to convey way too much with the musical score rather than actual story and dialogue. There was some good cinematography as Adam mentioned, but without any character development I really didn't care what happened. The anticipation building while waiting for the team to come out of the pawn shop and the relatively short car chase was about the only 5 minutes where I was getting into the movie, but then it lost me somehow.
The movie was also unnecessarily violent, which I can certainly handle but doesn't add to the film to see close-up stabbings or someone's face stomped to death. I get what it was trying to do in some cases - Ryan Gosling passionately kissing the female lead in an elevator seconds before shoving his Timberland through someone's skull. I'm sure the filmakers thought it was deep to have such romantic display with the over-the-top musical score juxtaposed with extreme violence...but it just didn't do anything for me. It was trying to be epic without having an actual story. Bald Bryan, you're out of your element.