Phil Freeman was kind enough to let me rant about Nicolas Winding Refn’s Drive for his site, Burning Ambulance:
Quiet, kind, possessing a propensity to kick your fucking head in if need be, and sporting a bad-ass satin jacket with a big scorpion on the back, Drive‘s nameless hero, played by Ryan Gosling, is an anomaly on the current action movie landscape. The thing is, though, he doesn’t quite work within the niche of smart-dumb action flicks of the past that Nicolas Winding Refn‘s film fastidiously mines either. See, Drive isn’t chillwave applied to action movies, it’s a clever, contemporary riff on existential tough guy cinema, referencing the right seventies and eighties cult classics, building up the syllabus of nihilistic action flicks only to later reject their deathwish narratives…
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Yea, I found this movie pretty similar to Thief, and thus, awesome. I think my favorite part was the driver threatening the guy he ran into at the diner with the very Mann-like “Stop that. Shut your mouth.” Stern, but still respectful, since he doesn’t really want things to get out of hand in public.
bding7
21 Sep 11 at 6:46 pm
Ha yeah, that’s the most ‘Thief’-like probably. Even there though (not arguing with you just adding to your point), it’s less about tough guy shit ala Frank in ‘Thief’ and more like, “we did a job now go away, I’m not your bro.” I just love how the Driver’s motivations for being a hard-ass are so different from most rogue male heroes.
Brandon
21 Sep 11 at 8:58 pm
yea, it’s like the Driver is trying to avoid the cycle of violence a guy like Frank (or Neil McCauley) have already been sucked into hoping for a normal life, but he’s definitely prepared for it.
bding7
21 Sep 11 at 9:21 pm