DVD Review: Drive (2011)

Why can't I recommend this film?

Director Nicolas Winding Refn isn't the best director working, but he is the most challenging. He has built a resume of off-kilter, violent films that force the audience to think (Bronson, Valhalla Rising, Pusher). Unfortunately, he usually leaves them thinking about things they'd prefer to avoid - the nature of violence, the fallibility of human nature, the dark side of fame and worship, the transitory foundations of our basic relationships/social pacts, etc. Refn deals in unpleasant concepts through unpleasant characters doing unpleasant things. He dispenses with filters and delivers harsh, sometimes hard to watch films.

This is a truly ugly movie. Even allowing for the fact that Refn's tale is one of criminality and broken morality, his displays are too much. His violence is too graphic, his characters too detached, his conclusions too flimsy.


Full Review Here