Blu-ray Review: DRIVE Rumbles Onto HD

Nicholas Winding Refn has, to my mind, made three perfectly-realized movies in his Pusher films and a series of subsequent experiments/exercises with Bronson, Valhalla Rising, and our topic of discussion here. I don't say that to mean that the latter three movies are somehow deficient for that--in fact, what makes Bronson in particular so thrilling is how playful it is with form and style as it gets into the head of the notorious criminal that is the subject of the film. And what's exciting about Refn as a filmmaker is that, like Tom Hardy's eloquent crook, Refn is more than willing to flex and stretch and reinvent himself with each work, no two of his movies looking or even really feeling alike.

Drive, however, like Valhalla Rising before it, pushes a little too hard for style, losing some of its substance as a result, a failing that can mainly be attributed to a mostly empty lead character played by Ryan Gosling who has the misfortune to be surrounded by a cast of terrific supporting players. Drive feels like such a broad meditation on the kind of moody underworld thrillers of this type that it's really engaging while you're watching it but sort of vague and hard to recall after the fact.

Again, I lay this all squarely on the lead character, simply called "the Driver" throughout the film, portrayed by Gosling a mysterious man with a set of rules that will, of course, have to be broken over the course of the movie for Irene, the pretty girl next door played by Carey Mulligan. Her husband has been recently released from jail and he's got some dangerous men after him unless he does a job. Driver's dubious but in his way, he's fallen for Mulligan's Irene. Terrible, violent things ensue.

I can understand the approach Refn, screenwriter Hossein Amini, and Gosling himself wanted to take with the character, making him a man of few words, somewhat awkward around other people, and slow to show emotion. The problem is that he feels--and I mean no offense here and this isn't a dig--almost autistic throughout. In quieter moments, Gosling doesn't seem to know what to do with his face, alternately between a goofy smirk and slack indifference. Throughout most of the film, he doesn't really modulate his voice beyond a flat monotone and it's seldom his emotions even reach his eyes. I think the intent was to go for hardened and difficult to read, but what we get instead is emotionally arrested.

The thing is, the search for cool, as it were, for Driver, is really the only black mark against the movie with its thoroughly remarkable supporting cast including Albert Brooks, Ron Pearlman, and Bryan Cranston. In each case, the actors use their limited time onscreen to communicate volumes about themselves and their relationships to each other, Brooks rightly singled out for a kind of affable menace throughout that makes Refn look like a genius for casting him. You could probably fill several movies worth of plot with the backstory behind these characters. Even in his small role as Irene's husband, Oscar Isaac gives us just enough to know the levels of love and desperation in his character, who in any other movie of this type would have been some kind of bully you were rooting for to die as soon as possible.

Looking back at my comments at the top of this piece, I realize now that it's unfair to say that the movie doesn't stick with you because obviously some of the performances definitely did. Likewise the gorgeously-shot night time Los Angeles Refn gives us here and the electric score by Cliff Martinez. But Driver himself is such a vacuum, that it's something of a challenge to single out about him and his part in the movie. The bloody, dangerous crime movie around him is terribly interesting, though, and if you somehow missed it last year, I definitely invite you to check it out.

Audio, Video, and Special Features

Allow me to say again that this movie looks gorgeous and it's got a great-looking disc to boot. The nighttime opening sequence makes L.A. look like a city of twinkling jewels on velvet thanks to the wonderful picture quality here. I can't cay I could discern anything mind-blowing about the audio, but the cars certainly rumble and roar when that kind of thing happens in the movie.

The special features are primarily 5-10 minute chats with the producers of the film about what made the movie work for them, and they spend a lot of time making a convincing defense for the character of Driver. The meatiest special feature, though, is a 20-odd minute chat with Refn about the creation of the film, his disastrous, tear-filled first meeting with star Ryan Gosling, and the cold medicine-induced fugue that brought Drive to the screen. Shame on the cover art, though, which superimposes Gosling's head on the body of a hammer-wielding maniac standing in the middle of the road. It's a strange and sloppy attempt to capture the all the key points of the movie when perhaps a still or something would have done less damage.

Drive is available on DVD, Blu-ray and VOD now.