4.5 stars. Rated R, for violence and profanity
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 6.30.17
Goodness.
Blend the hyper-driving
acceleration of Gone in 60 Seconds
with Quentin Tarantino’s bad-ass dark humor, add a touch of the most superbly
choreographed music-and-motion sequences ever concocted for classic Hollywood
musicals, and you’re getting close to
this audacious cinematic experience.
 |
| Baby (Ansel Elgort, left) has spent years working off his unusual debt to Doc (Kevin Spacey), motivated — in part — by the hope that, eventually, this servitude will end. But will this urbane crime lord really be willing to part with such a valuable asset? |
Because the result still must be
filtered through the impertinent sensibilities of British writer/director Edgar
Wright, he of the manic blend of thrills and whacked-out comedy found in his
cult-classic “Three Flavours Cornetto Trilogy” (Shaun of the Dead, Hot Fuzz
and The World’s End).
Baby Driver is no mere film; it’s a bold,
edge-of-the-seat vision from an auteur who deftly, irreverently exploits the
medium’s every aspect to the max. From the attention-grabbing prolog to the
suspensefully exhilarating climax — not to mention one of the best aw-shucks
Hollywood endings ever added as an epilog — Wright holds our attention to a
degree most filmmakers can only dream about.
You dare not even breathe, at risk of missing something
way-cool.
Not that you should worry about
it, because everything about this
flick is way-cool. Not to mention quite impressive, considering the way Wright
slides from accelerated, throat-clutching intensity to larkish meet-cute
romance — and back again — in the blink of an eye.
To cases:
Music means everything to Baby
(Ansel Elgort), who developed a horrific case of tinnitus during a childhood
accident, and drowns out the incessant whine by orchestrating every waking
moment to paralyzingly loud music pumped into his brain, via the ubiquitous ear
buds connected to one of a dozen iPods he carries at all times. Nor is he
content to rely on the Top 40 power anthems of today and yesterday; he also
mixes his own mash-ups of samples, beats and even offhand chatter captured via
pocket digital recorders.
Aside from serving as the perpetual
home-grown symphony to which he dances and sashays through even the most
mundane activities — such as making lunch — this constant aural companion also
propels Baby’s occasional occupation.
Some people drive. Baby drives.
A wayward, orphaned childhood
spent boosting cars led to snatching the wrong vehicle, at the wrong time: one
belonging to criminal mastermind Doc (Kevin Spacey), who couldn’t help admiring
the adolescent lad’s chutzpah. But Doc also couldn’t forgive the disrespect,
and — recognizing the kid’s behind-the-wheel moxie — apprenticed him as a go-to
getaway driver.
Now, Baby having matured into a
stoic twentysomething with plenty of attitude and confidence, he has become the
ne plus ultra of getaway drivers: a
meticulous tactician who maps out escape routes ahead of time, so that — once a
given job goes down — he can haul ass to the beat of carefully selected tunes
that translate into expertly timed hairpin turns, gear shifts and breathtaking
evasive maneuvers.
This talent has allowed the
Atlanta-based Doc to stage-manage an impressive streak of brazen daytime bank
robberies, always with a different three-person crew, and with Baby waiting in
the revved-up driver’s seat.
Wright opens his film with one
such heist, and — let’s just say — the vehicular aftermath, as Baby evades a few
dozen police cars, definitely captures our attention.
But that’s just for openers.
Wright then astonishes in an entirely different way, when the very next scene —
Baby being sent for coffee, while Doc and the others divide the take — turns
into a jaw-dropping display of cheeky effervescence, as Baby hops, skips,
jumps, sprints and strides in perfect time to his personal soundtrack, in what
we gradually realize is an ever-lengthening single take ... back and forth
along several city streets.
Dance films would kill for a
segment half this stylish.
Right then, by sliding so cockily
between two such smartly conceived extremes, Wright has our attention. Forever
and always.
The adrenaline rush gets ever
stronger, once we meet the grotesques hand-picked by Doc for these jobs:
Tarantino-style nasties to the core. The aforementioned prolog heist involves
scruffy mercenary Buddy (Jon Hamm), who can’t keep his hands off sexpot,
lollypop-licking partner Darling (Eiza González); and the mean, confrontational
Griff (Jon Bernthal).
Outrageous attire and appearances
notwithstanding, they radiate danger; we instantly fear for the silent and
apparently cowed Baby. But that’s deceptive; the kid holds his own, thanks to a
sassy blend of attitude and aptitude. After all, nobody can argue with his
talent behind the wheel.
On the home front, in between
assignments, Baby shares his digs with surrogate father Joseph (CJ Jones),
wheelchair-bound and deaf, but still nimble of mind and spirit. The two are
mutually devoted, a bond that Wright deftly sketches with sensitivity and
grace, and which Elgort and Jones portray with absolute conviction. We
immediately fear for Joseph, because the intimacy of this relationship is
wholly at odds with the scoundrels who populate Baby’s other life.
Our nervous sensibilities get
stretched even further when Baby stumbles into a meet-cute moment with
cute-as-a-button Debora (Lily James), a new waitress at the diner that he has
made a daily ritual (the reason not to be disclosed here). They spark; they
smolder: love at first sight, hastened by the wit and sparkling banter that too
few films deliver these days.
But an actual relationship is a
luxury Baby scarcely can afford, particularly when Doc summons him for another
job. And this crew is dominated by
the twitchy Bats (Jamie Foxx), an unstable psychopath with a casual propensity
toward collateral civilian casualties, in direct violation of Doc’s “no
unnecessary violence” mandate. Also along for the ride: the eternally dazed
Eddie “No-Nose” (Flea, of the Red Hot Chili Peppers), who always seems one or
two sentences behind any given conversation.
Neon signs blast in our brains: Things
can only end badly.
Granted, all of this is a
farcical exaggeration of anything remotely approaching reality, but that has
been the hallmark of Wright’s films. The magic comes from the manner in which
he turns his burlesque characters into people we genuinely care about, their
baroque behavior notwithstanding.
Not to mention the cheeky,
dark-dark-dark humor that also fuels
this outlandish saga.
Elgort, who impressed so much in The Fault in Our Stars — and then wasted
his time with the Divergent series —
makes Baby a smoothly trendy, hip-hop antihero. Even at his most impassive,
Elgort leaves no doubt about his character’s resolute morality and integrity.
Baby is a victim of circumstance and a single unfortunate adolescent mistake,
and we recognize his desire to escape.
Spacey has great fun with the
urbane and smoothly polished Doc, whose sophisticated veneer is — by itself — a
hilarious joke, amid the nasties with whom he surrounds himself. And yet, as
often is the case with Spacey’s performances, surface civility — and that
wintry smile — don’t quite conceal Doc’s lethal underbelly. Few actors can be
so simultaneously charming and malevolent.
The British James, until recently
delighting Downton Abbey fans as Lady
Rose MacClare, positively sparkles as the sweet, kind-eyed Debora. She’s the
iconic lovely that no mere mortal lad ever could hope to win, and yet James –
armed with Wright’s scrumptious banter — brings Debora down to earth, making
her vulnerable, perceptive, intelligent and just forlorn enough to be enticing.
How could Baby resist her? How
can we?
Foxx radiates the wary, waiting
intensity of a coiled rattlesnake; González is a sassy, salacious, tart-tongued
bad girl to the core. Hamm makes Buddy an intriguing study: at times
unexpectedly sympathetic toward Baby, and a kindred spirit when it comes to
music. Then again, Hamm laces Buddy’s gaze with something ... quietly feral.
High-fives go to editors Jonathan
Amos and Paul Machliss, who cut this super-charged roller coaster with an élan
matched only by Wright’s similar flamboyance; Bill Pope’s cinematography is
equally electrifying. Few crime thrillers would even consider involving a dance
coach, but then nothing about this film is average; choreographers Ryan
Heffington and Ryan Spencer also deserve enthusiastic kudos.
And goodness, then there’s the
music: a wall-to-wall genre mash-up that runs from The Damned’s “Neat Neat
Neat” and Focus’ “Hocus Pocus,” to The Commodores’ “Easy” and Dave Brubeck’s
“Unsquare Dance,” to Carla Thomas “B-A-B-Y” and T. Rex’s “Debora,” along with
dozens more. Not to mention a certain Simon and Garfunkel anthem.
Wright assembles all the pieces
brilliantly, playing our hearts and minds with the precision that Baby employs
while preparing his mix-tapes. “Baby Driver” is summer’s first surprise: an exhilarating
event destined to make a fortune —
both now and later, when it hits home video — because you’ll want to watch it
over and over.
Like, wow.
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