Drive

Plot

A man in Los Angeles (billed as "The Driver") works as a mechanic, stunt double, and criminal-for-hire getaway driver. His jobs are all managed by auto shop owner Shannon, who persuades Jewish-American mobster Bernie Rose and his half-Italian partner Nino "Izzy" Paolozzi to purchase a stock car for the Driver to race as a legitimate business for them all.

The Driver grows close to his new neighbor, Irene, and her young son, Benicio, but their relationship is interrupted when Irene's husband, Standard Gabriel, is released from prison. While in prison, Standard owed protection money to an Albanian gangster named Cook, who demands Standard rob a pawn shop for $40,000 to pay off the debt, threatening to harm Benicio and Irene. Driver offers to act as the getaway driver for Standard and Blanche, Cook's accomplice.

At the pawn shop, Blanche exits with a bag of money, but Standard is killed by the store owner. Another car waiting in the parking lot immediately pursues them, but Driver shakes it off. Hiding at a motel, a suspicious Driver forces Blanche to admit she and Cook planned to take the money for themselves, and Cook's henchmen were in the waiting car. She also reveals the bag holds $1 million. Informed by her text messages, two gunmen locate the motel room and one kills Blanche. Driver, in return, kills both gunmen.

Shannon offers to hide the money, but Driver declines. Interrogating Cook at a strip club, he learns that Nino was behind the robbery. The Driver calls Nino and offers to return the money in exchange for peace. However, Nino instead sends a hitman to the Driver and Irene's apartment building. The Driver tells an angry Irene about his involvement with her husband's death, and they enter the elevator, not realizing the hitman is waiting inside. Noticing the man's gun, the Driver kisses Irene goodbye. He subdues and brutally stomps the hitman to death in front of a horrified Irene.

The Driver confronts Shannon, who reveals that he called Bernie about the money and unwittingly mentioned Irene. Furious, the Driver tells Shannon to flee, as Nino will surely hunt them both. Nino reveals to Bernie that a low-level Philadelphia mobster stashed the money at the pawn shop to set up a new operation. Anyone tied to the robbery must be killed, as they could lead the East Coast Italian-American Mafia to Nino and Bernie. Learning this, Bernie reluctantly murders Cook.

Cast

Ryan Gosling as "The Driver"

Carey Mulligan as Irene Gabriel

Bryan Cranston as Shannon

Albert Brooks as Bernie Rose

Oscar Isaac as Standard Gabriel

Christina Hendricks as Blanche

Ron Perlman as Nino 'Izzy' Paolozzi

Kaden Leos as Benicio Gabriel

James Biberi as Chris "Cook"

Russ Tamblyn as Doc

Production

Development

The novel Drive by James Sallis was published in 2005. Producers Marc Platt and Adam Siegel of Marc Platt Productions optioned the novel after Siegel read a review in Publishers Weekly. The Driver intrigued Siegel because he was "the kind of character you rarely see anymore — he was a man with a purpose; he was very good at one thing and made no apologies for it". The character interested Platt, because he reminded him of movie heroes he looked up to as a child, characters typically portrayed by Steve McQueen or Clint Eastwood.

Hossein Amini adapted the novel for the screen. He felt it was a rare book to receive from a studio because it was short, gloomy, and like a poem. Since the novel does not present a linear story, but has many flashbacks and jumps around in time, Amini found the adaptation challenging. He felt the non-linear structure made it "a very tricky structure" for a feature film.

A film adaptation of Drive was first announced in early 2008, with Neil Marshall set to direct what was being described as "an L.A.-set action mystery", planned as a starring vehicle for Hugh Jackman. Universal Studios, which had tried to make a film version for some time, was also on board. By February 2010, Marshall and Jackman were no longer attached to the project.

Platt contacted actor Ryan Gosling about Drive early on. Platt explained: "I have this list that I've created of very talented individuals whose work inspire me — writers, directors, actors whom I have to work with before I go onto another career or do something else with my life." Despite having starred in films of diverse genres, Gosling had never starred in anything like Drive but had been interested in acting in an action-oriented project. Gosling said that he had been put off by the many current action genre films that focused more on stunts instead of characters. He responded to Platt about two days later, as he was strongly attracted to the plot and the leading role. He thought the story had a "very strong character" at its core, and a "powerful" romance.

In an interview with Rotten Tomatoes, Gosling was asked what had attracted him to the film, and whether he had read the earlier script when Jackman and director Neil Marshall were attached to it. He said:

I think that might be the original one I read. I read a few drafts. I read one as well where he wasn't a stunt driver at all, which was a newer draft – maybe that's the one Hugh Jackman had; I'm not sure exactly. Basically when I read it, in trying to figure out who would do something like this, the only way to make sense of this is that this is a guy that's seen too many movies, and he's started to confuse his life for a film.

Casting

When casting roles in his films, Refn does not watch casting tapes or have his actors audition for him. Instead, he meets with them and casts them on the spot if he feels they are right. Drive was the first film that British actress Carey Mulligan signed to do after being nominated for an Academy Award for her role in An Education (2009), which was directed by Lone Scherfig, also a Danish filmmaker (Scherfig used to babysit Refn when he was a child, and they have become good friends). At the time of Mulligan's casting, Refn had not seen An Education. However, his wife was a fan of the film and Mulligan's performance, and she urged him to cast her. In the original script, the character was a Hispanic woman named Irina. The character was changed to Irene after Mulligan was cast; Refn said that he "couldn't find any actress that would click with [him] personally".

While working on the film, Refn had some cast and production members move in temporarily with him, his wife and two daughters in their home in Los Angeles. This included Carey Mulligan and Hossein Amini, the screenwriter. This enabled them to be immersed in the film. Refn and Amini made significant changes to the original script during this time.

Bryan Cranston plays the role of Shannon. Refn knew he wanted to cast Cranston, as he was a fan of his work in the TV series Breaking Bad. Knowing Cranston had other opportunities, Refn asked the actor how he would like to develop the role. After not hearing back, Refn called him; Cranston was just then writing the pros and cons of doing Drive for himself. Moved by Refn's interest, Cranston accepted the part. Christina Hendricks plays the small role of Blanche. "Trying to work in a more reality arena for a character like that," Refn originally auditioned porn stars for Blanche. He was unable to find anyone with the necessary acting talent. After meeting with Hendricks, he decided to cast her, as he felt her persona would click with the character.

Albert Brooks plays the foul-mouthed, morose Bernie Rose. When Refn suggested him, Gosling agreed but thought the actor might not want to play a character who is violent and sullen or appear in a film that he did not work on himself. Brooks accepted the role to go against type, and because he loved that Bernie was not a cliché.

There are six people you could always get to play this kind of part, and I like that the director was thinking outside of the box. For me, it was an opportunity to act outside the box. I liked that this mobster had real style. Also, he doesn't get up in the morning thinking about killing people. He's sad about it. Upset about it. It's a case of, 'Look what you made me do.'

Filming and cinematography

The film was made on a production budget of about $15 million and shot in various parts of Los Angeles, beginning on September 25, 2010. Locations were picked by Refn while Gosling drove him around the city at night. At the director's request, Los Angeles was picked as the shooting location due to budget constraints. Refn moved into a plush Los Angeles home and insisted that the cast members and screenwriter Amini move in with him. They would work on the script and film all day, then watch films, edit, or drive at night. Refn asked that the editing suite be placed in his home as well. With a shooting script of 81 pages, Refn and Gosling continued to trim dialogue during filming.

The opening chase scene, involving Gosling's character, was filmed primarily by Refn within the car's interior. In an interview, he said he intended for this scene to emulate the feeling of a "diver in an ocean of sharks," and never left the vehicle during the car chase so that the audience can see what's happening from the character's point of view. To economize money and time, he shot the scene in two days. With two different set-ups prepared in the car, the director found it difficult to have mobility with the camera, so he would switch the camera to two additional set-ups nearby. As downtown Los Angeles had been rejuvenated, Refn avoided certain areas to maintain the novel's gloomy atmosphere. The scene was shot at low angles with minimal light.

The elevator sequence was shot without dialogue. Refn explained:

A scene like the elevator sequence in Drive, for instance, has no dialogue, just a series of stunning visuals and graphic imagery – that's a prime example of how the film conveys so many ideas and emotions through images rather than words.

Before shooting the head-smashing scene, Refn spoke to Gaspar Noé and asked him how he had done a similar scene in his film Irréversible (2002). Crossing the line from romance to violence, the scene begins with the Driver and Irene kissing tenderly. What they share is really a goodbye kiss. The Driver becomes a kind of "werewolf," violently stomping the hit man's head in. Irene sees the Driver in a new light.

Of this scene, Refn said:

Style and inspiration

Andrew O'Hehir of Salon magazine described Drive as a "classic Los Angeles heist-gone-wrong story," that "isn't trying to outdo Bullitt or get the next assignment in The Fast and the Furious franchise". O'Hehir also described homages to "Roger Corman's B-movie aesthetic and the glossy Hollywood spectacles of Michael Mann". Steven Zeitchik of the Los Angeles Times examined themes in the characters of "loyalty, loneliness and the dark impulses that rise up even when we try our hardest to suppress them". Reuters' Nick Vinocur described a series of comic gore, resulting in "a bizarre concoction ... reminiscent of David Lynch's Mulholland Drive ... Quentin Tarantino's Pulp Fiction, and [with] angst-laden love scenes that would not be out of place in a Scandinavian drama". Christopher Hawthorne, also from the Los Angeles Times, has compared it to the works of Walter Hill, John Carpenter, Nathanael West, J. G. Ballard, and Mike Davis. According to Refn, Drive is dedicated to filmmaker Alejandro Jodorowsky and includes shades of Jodorowsky's existentialism.

Drive has been described as a tough, hard-edged, neo-noir, art house feature, extremely violent and very stylish, with European art and exploitation influences. Drive also refers to 1970s and 1980s cult hits such as The Day of the Locust (1975) and To Live and Die in L.A. (1985). Other influences can be seen in the neon-bright opening credits and the retro song picks – "a mix of tension-ratcheting synthesizer tones and catchy club anthems that collectively give the film its consistent tone". Drive's title sequence is hot-pink, which was inspired by Risky Business (1983). Refn has also indicated that the film's romance was partly inspired by the films of writer-director John Hughes.

Refn's inspiration for Drive came partly from reading Grimms' Fairy Tales, and his goal was to make "a fairy tale that takes Los Angeles as the background," with The Driver as the hero. To play with the common theme of fairy tales, The Driver protects what is good while at the same time killing degenerate people in violent ways. Refn said Drive turns into a superhero film during the elevator scene when The Driver kills the villain. The director said he was also inspired by films such as Point Blank (1967), Two-Lane Blacktop (1971), The Driver (1978), and Thief (1981). Jean-Pierre Melville's crime productions influenced the cinematography. Amini's script imposes "a kind of sideways moral code," where even those who comply with it are almost never rewarded for their efforts, as seen when The Driver helps Standard because of concern for Irene and her son. In their vehicles, the characters not only make escapes or commit murder but try to find peace and search for romance.

Music

Refn chose Johnny Jewel of Desire and Chromatics to score the film. The album consists of songs blended with electronic, ambient and retro music. Although Jewel's music was used in the score, at the last minute the studio hired experienced score composer Cliff Martinez. Refn gave him a sampling of songs he liked and asked Martinez to emulate the sound, resulting in "a kind of retro, 80ish, synthesizer europop". Most of its ethereal electronic-pop score was composed by Martinez. The score contains tracks with vintage keyboards and bluntly descriptive titles.

Drive (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack) was released on CD on September 19, 2011, by Lakeshore Records. Prior to that, owing to viral reviews such as those found on Twitter, the soundtrack sold well on iTunes, climbing as high as number four on the sales charts. The album was released on vinyl in June 2012, by Mondo. It received positive responses and peaked the soundtrack list from Billboard and Official Charts Company, while also peaked at 30th position on the US Billboard 200. A re-scored soundtrack for the film was produced for the BBC by Zane Lowe for its television broadcast in October 2014, which included original music from Chvrches, Banks, Bastille, Eric Prydz, SBTRKT, Bring Me the Horizon, The 1975 and Laura Mvula.

In September 2016, Lakeshore and Invada Records released a fifth anniversary special edition pressing of the soundtrack, featuring new liner notes and artwork. That same month, Johnny Jewel, College, Electric Youth, and Cliff Martinez discussed the impact of the soundtrack and film on their lives and contemporary music culture. Jewel told Aaron Vehling that Drive's "blend of sonic and visual nostalgia with a contemporary spin is always deadly." The soundtrack was listed on Spin magazine's list of 40 Movie Soundtracks That Changed Alternative Music.

Release

Prior to beginning principal photography, Refn went to the 2010 Cannes Film Festival to sell the rights to Drive and released promotional posters for the film. In November 2010, FilmDistrict acquired North American distribution rights, the first major acquisition at the American Film Market that year, beating other studios including Summit Entertainment and Lionsgate. The owners were so eager to get their hands on Drive, that they started negotiating to buy it before seeing any footage, believing it could appeal to people who enjoy a genre movie, as well as the arthouse crowd. The film had a release date of September 16, 2011, in the United States.

The film premiered on May 20, in competition at the 2011 Cannes Film Festival. At its first showing the film received abundant praise and "some of the best responses of the festival," but Xan Brooks of The Guardian, who gave it a positive review, said it "can't win, won't win" Cannes's top prize. Brooks explained that "it's too self-consciously retro, too much a series of cool, blank surfaces as opposed to a rounded, textured drama," but said that it was his "guilty pleasure" of the 2011 competition, labeling it an enjoyable affair. He said,

Over the past 10 days we've witnessed great art and potent social commentary; the birth of the cosmos and the end of the world. Turns out what we really wanted all along was a scene in which a man gets his head stomped in a lift. They welcome it in like a long-lost relation.

The film was greeted with hoots and howls of joy from the media, with viewers cheering on some of the scenes featuring extreme violence. Drive received a 15-minute standing ovation from the crowd. The festival awarded Refn best director for Drive.

Drive was screened at the Los Angeles Film Festival (LAFF) on June 20 at its gala screenings program. It was among more than 200 feature films, short projects, and music videos, from more than 30 countries, to be shown during the festival. After Red Dog's release date was pushed up by several days, Drive replaced it as the Melbourne International Film Festival's closing night film. The film was also screened during FilmDistrict's studio panel presentation at San Diego Comic-Con. A secret screening for Drive was held at London's Empire Big Screen during the middle of August. In September, Drive screened as a special presentation during the 2011 Toronto International Film Festival, alongside another film starring Gosling, The Ides of March.

Reception

Box office

Drive grossed $81.4 million worldwide. In North America, the film grossed a total of $35.1 million. The film opened in North America earning $11.3 million on the weekend of September 16, 2011, and played at 2,866 theaters. It was one of four wide releases that opened that weekend and came in second. The other three new releases included the re-release of The Lion King on 3D, which was the top film, along with the Straw Dogs remake and the romantic comedy I Don't Know How She Does It. The film closed its North American theatrical run on February 9, 2012.

In the international marketplace, Drive grossed $46.3 million. The film had its highest-grossing box office in France, where it earned a total of €10.3 million ($13.3 million). It opened in France on the weekend of October 5, 2011, at 246 theaters, eventually expanding to 360. The film opened in second place and had the highest per-screen theater gross for the weekend €10,722 ($13,786). Its second-highest overseas gross came in the United Kingdom, where it earned a total of £3.1 million ($4.6 million). Drive opened in the United Kingdom on September 27, 2011, at 176 theaters, eventually expanding to 190. The film opened in Australia on October 27, 2011, and grossed a total of $2.3 million in the country.

Critical response

Review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes reports an approval rating of 93% based on 275 reviews, and an average rating of 8.30/10. The site's critical consensus states, "With its hyper-stylized blend of violence, music, and striking imagery, Drive represents a fully realized vision of arthouse action." Metacritic, another review aggregator, gave it a score of 79 out of 100, based on 43 critics, indicating "generally favorable" reviews. Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "C−" on an A+ to F scale.

It was one of the highest-ranked, and most-featured, films on critics' year-end top 10 lists. It ranked as the fourth-best film of the year, behind The Tree of Life, The Artist, and Melancholia on Metacritic's tally of top 10 lists. Drive was picked as the best film of the year by: Peter Travers of Rolling Stone, Richard Roeper of the Chicago Sun-Times, James Rocchi of BoxOffice, Joshua Rothkopf of Time Out (New York), Neil Miller of Film School Rejects, Mark Russell of The Oregonian, and a staff critic from Empire magazine.

The writers for the film magazine Empire listed Drive as their number one film of 2011. Peter Travers of Rolling Stone gave the film 4 out of 4 stars, declaring that Drive was "a brilliant piece of nasty business," and that "Refn is a virtuoso, blending tough and tender with such uncanny skill that he deservedly won the Best Director prize at Cannes." Travers also said, "Prepare to be blown away by Albert Brooks. Brooks' performance, veined with dark humor and chilling menace (watch him with a blade), deserves to have Oscar calling." The Wall Street Journal's Joe Morgenstern also praised Brooks's performance, calling his villainous performance "sensational." James Rocchi of The Playlist gave the film an "A" letter grade, and wrote that "Drive works as a great demonstration of how, when there's true talent behind the camera, entertainment and art are not enemies but allies." Rocchi placed Drive as his number one film of 2011.

Movieline's Stephanie Zacharek rated the film 9.5 out of 10, complimenting the film's action and writing that it "defies all the current trends in mainstream action filmmaking. The driving sequences are shot and edited with a surgeon's clarity and precision. Refn doesn't chop up the action to fool us into thinking it's more exciting than it is." She also admired Refn's skill in handling the film's violence and the understated romance between Gosling and Mulligan. Drive was Roger Ebert's seventh-best film of 2011. In praising the film, he wrote, "Here is a movie with respect for writing, acting, and craft. It has respect for knowledgeable moviegoers." Like Zacharek, Ebert admired the film's action sequences, which were practically made and did not rely on CGI effects.

Legacy

Drive has gained a cult following since its release in 2011, particularly for Refn's stylized direction, silent protagonist, neon-inflicted visuals, and electronic soundtrack. It has been characterized as a crossover between arthouse and mainstream cinema, and its influence has been discussed in relation to contemporary visual style, music, fashion, and the revival of 1980s-inspired aesthetics.

The film's iconography and soundtrack remain popular and recognizable amongst cinephile circles. The Driver's satin scorpion jacket became one of the film's most recognizable images and developed a life of its own outside the film. Replicas of the jacket were produced following the film's release, while it became a recurring Halloween costume and a subject of fashion coverage. More than a decade after Drive's release, GQ described it as one of the most iconic pieces of cinematic outerwear of its generation and reported that costume designer Erin Benach was still most frequently asked about the jacket among her work.

The film's soundtrack, which features "Nightcall" by Kavinsky and "A Real Hero" by David Grellier (College) and "Electric Youth", is often credited with helping popularize synthwave music with a wider audience.

The film has been marked as Nicolas Winding Refn's breakout amongst the mainstream, despite having directed 7 films prior. Miles Surrey of The Ringer (website) writes:

Released in the same year as Fast Five, a delirious blockbuster that culminates with a giant vault tearing through the streets of Rio de Janeiro, Drive’s bravura opening highlighted that there’s more than one way to execute a nail-biting car chase, especially when operating on an indie budget. If the Fast & Furious franchise represented where Hollywood was headed—its street racers turning into physics-defying superheroes that would compete with the likes of Marvel—then Drive was a throwback molded by neo-noir classics like Bullitt, The Driver, and Thief (film). As far as first impressions go, Drive’s opening car chase was one hell of a table-setter; it’s among the strongest sequences of Refn’s entire career. At the same time, though, Drive is a microcosm of what makes the Danish auteur so polarizing.

Due to numerous thematic and narrative similarities to the Grand Theft Auto videogame series (particularly its earlier instalments), several observers have recognized Drive as one of the films closest to realizing a big screen adaptation of the series.

Accolades

Drive was nominated for four British Academy Film Awards, which included Best Film, Best Direction, Best Actress in a Supporting Role (Carey Mulligan), and Best Editing. It was one of the most-nominated films by critics' groups in 2011. Albert Brooks had the most nominations from critics' groups. Refn won the Best Director Award at the 64th Cannes Film Festival. The film also received an Academy Award nomination for Best Sound Editing.