Drive - Overrated? Would You Kill Me if I Said, "Yes"?

Happy New Year from Ensign Lestat.

I watched 'Drive' last evening. No reason why, barring the fact that it was much talked about in 2011 and almost all the reviews were positive. I, somehow or other, managed to read the one rare negative review of it when it was released and remember being very surprised by it. But I'm going to put that down to my finger-clicking - it knows what it wants to read, and that is usually an article or review that goes against the grain.

In hindsight I feel that review I read gave a little too much away - spoiler alerts may have helped, as, now that I've watched the film, I knew some of characters' next steps in advance, and perhaps that destroyed some of the storytelling for me.

Well, anyway, enough of that. By now most people have probably watched this film, but I shall give a short synopsis anyway.

Based on the James Sallis book of the same name, 'Drive' follows our nameless protagonist (Ryan Gosling), a film stuntman and garage-hand by day, getaway driver by night. Intriguing, isn't it? We get to follow him from the time just before he meets, befriends and eventually falls for neighbour, Irene (Carey Mulligan). Life goes smoothly till Irene's husband, Standard (Oscar Isaac) is released from jail. Then things really start to hit the fan.

The description of the protagonist itself piques ones curiosity and him being successfully nameless throughout is a testament to the writer, Hossein Amini and director, Nicholas Winding Refn's work. It reminded me of Polanski's 'The Ghost', in which Ewan McGregor's character is never named either. It's only after the film that I realised neither had a name.

Another oft-talked about fact were the long silences in the film. They were definitely effective and, I felt, a necessity as well. A lot of life goes by without words being spoken, and those silent moments, especially the ones between Gosling and Mulligan are memorable.

I enjoyed most of Gosling's performance in this film. He had the reserved, doe-eyed look down pat. It was when more than that was required he seemed, at least in my opinion, to falter.

Halfway through the film, when Standard returns, the entire pace, mood and I would say, genre of the film changes - dramatically. It was most disconcerting for me since I haven't read the book. There is an abundance of violence, gore and most frustrating of them all, nudity. Out of the blue, a languid, character-driven film becomes about several people, talking and offing other people. I can't say there is a lack of motivation for the character's actions, but one had to think them out by oneself, rather than receive adequate information in the narrative. For example, at one point, Gosling's character is told that if some money is not given to a certain crime boss, people will get hurt. Now we know that this is going to have a deep impact on Gosling's character - but he doesn't react. He acts on this information, yes, but his poker face is deceptive, or at least it was to me.

I've read some other very positive reviews of the film, but I can't seem to understand the viewpoint. From the start I felt I may just find this film difficult to understand. Why? Because of the titling. The titles are in purple, in what looks like Comic Sans font (I'm not an expert on fonts, that's what it looks like to me). What's up with that? It looks like the kind of titling you'd find in a '70s or '80s women-centric dance movie, or something. It doesn't quite go with the story, especially not with the second and third acts. The first... maybe, a little, but not the rest of the film.

The change of genre is what took me completely out of the film. That and Christina Hendricks. No, I'm kidding. I have nothing against her, but after her cameo in this film (yes, it's a cameo), I feel she may be overrated. Her acting during a particular car chase sequence was appalling and I'm really glad we didn't have to put up with her for too long. The rest of the supporting cast, thankfully, were spot on with their roles.

As I said, I enjoyed watching Gosling's acting, but he needed to emote more in the last two acts.

What I did love about this film was the music. I'm listening to it right now, and it sounds pretty spectacular to me. Techno-electronica is becoming more successful in films these days, and I hope Cliff Martinez continues to get scoring opportunities. Even some of the songs were catchy.

All in all I feel this film could have been great, but with the first half not being an indicative enough prelude to what was to come, it became uncomfortable, and not enjoyable. I still cannot figure out the scene in the dressing rooms - maybe that was how it was written in the book, but it just came off as in-your-face and sleazy in the film.

I wasn't expecting anything when I sat down to watch 'Drive', but I have found that I usually don't really enjoy films that are highly acclaimed. A pity really.