Drive - a reflection
Drive is possibly the most interesting Bait'n'Switch movie I've seen, of the type that Let The Right One In also had elements of.
You see, it turned out on Friday, during discussion of the movie, that all my work colleagues think there's a love story in there. That the guy realises he can't have the girl and the violence. But he has to (has to!? really?) commit the violence. So he loses the girl.
He never wanted the girl.
Moreover: he never had the girl.
The best bit about it is how utterly explicit Drive is about being exactly the opposite kind of movie to the movie my work colleagues think it is. And they still missed it.
I mean, c'mon, the little kid outright says that sharks can never be good.
The guy wears an actual, literal mask when he's driving for hollywood films.
Even the "romantic subplot montage" was carefully constructed to give the appearance of romance developing, when actually there was none. He took them on a drive, to a spot where they had an afternoon of fun, then they went home. The husband isn't worried because there's nothing to worry about. We're so used to certain kinds of things happening that we fill in the blanks all too readily when given cues.
I laughed aloud at the "romantic subplot montage", but it was interesting to discuss with people who saw something completely other than my experience - who bought it.
But I digress. Bait'n'switch, I called it -- you be wondering why?
Because it promises a movie about a guy whose passion, whose centre, is driving. It gives us elements of a glorious success story there, a potential. Which then takes a violent left turn into nastyville that we are supposed to imagine could have been avoided.
But those moments above: the shark, the mask, these are dotted throughout the film. They tell us in no uncertain terms that our nameless "hero" (and a true human being) is really a dangerous psychopath. Not a normal guy who flips out when confronted with this unimaginable stuff. Because normal guys don't, as a rule.
And yes, the stuff that heros are made of is also the stuff of psychopaths. Where's the borderline? How much of any Hollywood story do we interpret as heroism rather than indication of sociopathy, simply because of the framing?
And the answer is: a lot. Take my work colleagues: even when explicitly given a person who shows no outward emotion, who doesn't feel fear, who doesn't manifest the normal physical responses to threats, who realises that stomping a guy into a pulp might have overstepped the lines of acceptable only when seeing the look of fear and horror in someone else's eyes... even then, they still interpret him as the hero, as the guy who went a little too far, but still deserved the girl.
This guy, it should be pointed out, moves his employer/friend's head not out of compassion for a dead man, but because he has to get to the latch for the boot of the car to be able to retrieve the money.
The "Drive" of the title, is the hero. What drives him -- that's the key to the film. It's his drive -- not his driving -- that is the central lynchpin.
At the beginning of the film, our nameless hero is driving, and he's set up his own little rules about the world, and how it works. You get his driving for five minutes around your criminal activity (or whatever). If something happens, he's there for you. Unless five minutes have passed, in which case, you're on your own.
All the shit that goes down happens in his five minute window. The five minutes isn't up when Standard is killed, when Blanche climbs into his car. It isn't up until he gives back the money, I think. He's there for Standard, until the tie to that -- the money -- is given back. It's a little fucked up, but internally consistent.
He play-acts having a family. He wears the trappings of it, trying it on, like another mask he gets to wear while the husband is away. How much of his caring is real, and how much of that is play-act? It's hard to tell.
I'm sure I've got more I want to say, but it escapes me for the moment.