80s Film Noire

"You give me a time, and a place; I give you a five minute window."

The Man With No Name concept pioneered by Sergio Leone and Akira Kurosawa has been emulated, paid homage too, brought to strange new places and ripped off so frequently it has become a rarity to see the concept done right. I watched Drive fueled by heavy recommendation from friends and peers and in all honesty came pretty late to the show. 2011 was set a-rave by reviews of the movie and I can't quite remember what stopped me from checking it out earlier. If you're a fan of Michael Mann and the reserved, intense, drawn out fashion in which he infuses his work then Drive is a movie you shouldn't miss.

There isn't a single lackluster performance throughout and all of them revolve around the sobering gravity in which Ryan Gosling plays the driver. He is reserved and soft-spoken enough to give the impression of emotional handicap - any hint of joy breaks through his face like the sun through an overcast sky, such is the rarity. He exhibits none of the invincible characteristics of most action heroes; actually his success can be accredited to a ruthless professional attitude synchronized with vast emotional detachment. This is a movie that will only allow you to smile when it's the kind of smile that hurts. The plot unrolls with the unstoppable weight of a Greek tragedy - like the original cut of Mel Gibson's Payback - wherein every character could potentially save themselves but their natures and principles and circumstance only ensnare them deeper. Gosling is exceptionally skilled behind the wheel - the film opens with him coolly driving the escape vehicle for a heist, and evading the police not so much through a quick-cut high-intensity action sequence but by a maintenance of calm under pressure, great ingenuity, and the ruthless adherence to a sort of code or principle his profession demands. Very much like the samurai of Kurosawa's Yojimbo. The opening sequence establishes the mood and then the plot elements are introduced. The emotional triangle (I don't want to say "love" triangle because it seems to coarse a term) is established between Gosling, a young single mother and her child, and the estranged father soon-to-be released from prison.

Nicolas Winding Refn (director) is a master of showing and not telling. An intelligent audience will draw their own conclusions as to why a professional such as Gosling's character would allow themselves to be drawn into the complications of other people's lives. This is what makes Drive so god-damn compelling. The relationship with Irene (Carey Mulligan) which nevers gets off the ground, the implied guilt which compels him to unselfishly help her husband... you could say that the film almost languishes on these details but it draws you in so deep the next time violence and action occurs it seems almost an intrusion by comparison.

I'm going to take a minute here to minutely digress from Drive and speak on the presentation of violence in cinema. I mentioned before in my other blog that I often find myself obsessing over the realistic portrayal of violence in media; this is most likely because of my intimate exposure to actual violence across the pond. Stylistic liberties notwithstanding (and even then, there is a line between stylistic violence done right - 300 - and done wrong - Kick Ass) I often despise the way in which violence is thrown in our faces. There is nothing cool about it, and I'm a professional in terms of its application. There are dark, biological compulsions within us that drive us towards the violent resolution of conflict and as a First World Nation it should be our prerogative to seek alternate resolutions or use the controlled application of violence (military intervention) as a last resort. When violence does break out it's often short, nasty, unexpected, brutal, and traumatic. Anyone who's ever witnessed a street fight would do well to analyse the reactions of bystanders - stunned, mortified, shaken - if you're not too entranced by the spectacle itself. Alluring and toxic, like most dangerous things in our world. When Martin Scorsese presents violence, he often does so within two precedents; that violence is an inevitable part of everyday human experience, and that is shocking and traumatic. Take the department store fight scene from The Departed; Di Caprio's character brutally assaults two Italian gangsters with unapologetic brutality. The scene ends with Di Caprio gouging one of the men with a coat-rack while pop music plays in the background. Just another day in Boston, the music suggests. 

In Drive I don't think there was a single violent act that wasn't discomforting or shocking; and this is largely due to Refn's masterful use of pacing. The long pauses in between action sequences and the emotional depth and complexity these sequences have draw us so deep into the moods and interactions and motivations and curiosities and dramas of the characters that we are shaken out of our stupor when someone is say, stabbed viciously in the eye with a fork and then repeatedly stabbed in the neck with a kitchen knife. Gosling gets out of fights and kills the way an animal escapes and fights in the wild. He rarely pulls a punch because his life and the lives of others are at stakes. That being said, when he staggers away covered in blood we aren't pumping our fists or laughing; we are thrilled and sobered by the intensity of the scene. 

Drive is a fantastic movie, but don't expect to leave the theater or your couch with particularly uplifted spirits afterwards. The film is 80s homage and film-noire at its best and most unexpected; everything from the lighting, costumes, and To Live and Die in L. A-style credits font screams style. With its sparse dialogue and lack of exposition, the narrative is largely told through the shadows of its characters and their actions rather than directly and is stronger because of it. In the blog I write with Cam I recently explored the various ways in which villainy is outright perceived in fiction. I failed to touch upon another way, in that there is no villain, merely antagonists; in Drive there is not a single unsympathetic character, only characters whose nature may upset our sensibilities. The villains are only villains in that they act against our protagonists and their successes and failures only provoke sadness at the circumstantial nihilism that sets the stage. 

Before I step out I will mention that the movie also has a brilliant soundtrack and if we're going to talk about the mood Drive establishes, what more do I really need to say?