Baby Driver

Dir: Edgar Wright

2017

****

After Edgar Wright walked from Ant-Man, a project he'd put a lot of heart and soul into, he needed to come back with some special and something he could get passionate about, so he went back to an idea he had back in 1994. The idea - of a get away driver who was obsessed with music - was actually realised in a music video he made for the British re-mix electronic beat masters Mint Royale back in 2003. The video for 'Blue Song' stared Noel Fielding as the music obsessed driver and his Mighty Boosh co-star Julian Barratt and Wright regulars Nick Frost and Michael Smiley as his bank-robbing passengers. During the heist (which we never see) Fielding listens, dances and performs in time to the music in the corner of a multi-story car park. It's a great little video, especially if you like contemporary British comedy. The intro to 2017's Baby Driver is essentially that video all over again, with Ansel Elgort replacing Noel Fielding and the Jon Spencer Blues Explosion replacing Mint Royale. I'll be honest, I didn't like this intro scene at all. It looked like a cheap and nasty remake of the old music video - with better music granted - but unconvincing and utterly charmless. Thankfully, it got much better very quickly. Wright has built on his original idea rather well, and I thoroughly enjoyed Baby Driver from (just after the) start until finish. However, the concept that has been much hyped, of the film essentially being one long music video, keeping in time with the constant soundtrack, isn't quite accurate. There are wonderful flourishes of action following the beat of whatever song is playing at the time, but it's hardly a constant thing, or even much of a concept. Nor is it something particularly original. I like it, but I feel the film was sold on a quirk that isn't the whole film, I feel it undersells what is a perfectly good high-octane crime thriller romance. Still, that's a pre-production marketing thing, the music-heavy themed action works very well in the film and is, thankfully, never overdone as I'd worried might be the case. So the concept isn't really original and the story certainly isn't either, but this isn't a problem, as the story is told slightly differently than one might expect and it is told very well. There is nothing new about bank robberies or the age old tale of a nice guy involved crime, sometimes against his will, who wants out, after one last heist (that goes terribly wrong), to be with the girl he loves. The story has been told with unique twists since the beginning of cinema, Baby Driver goes back to basics in many respects, but the story is a familiar one and has all the same cliches - it's just that here they are updated. This is not criticism though, as I feel Wright has totally understood and immersed himself in the genre and has improved on each element. The romantic side of the story is perfect, and also doubled. Baby meets Debora (Lily James) working as a waitress in a classical American Diner - the spark is there from the very beginning and it only gets brighter as the film goes on. In contrast, you also have Buddy and Darling (John Hamm and Eiza González), the classic True Romance couple we've all seen many times before but with just enough of a Bonny and Clyde essence about them for them to still be bad guys. They are a cynical version of Clarence and Alabama, had they gone broke after walking into the sunset at the end of True Romance. Both couples are integral to the overall feel of the film, Wright is basically taking the classic crime couple, splitting the cliche into two and updating both. He does exactly the same with the two main bad guys. Kevin Spacey plays the film's crime King-Pin, the reason Baby can't get out of the crime syndicate and Jamie Foxx plays the gangster on the rise to power who doesn't like or understand Baby's style. Each character's conclusion comes as a refreshing surprise, Baby Driver follows all crime thriller formulas while re-writing them completely. I would say it works 98% of the time, with only a couple of cartoonish scenes keeping it from being the full 100. Apart from a couple of overlong scenes (I'm afraid Wright does have an issue with editing) I loved everything about it but it is missing something important. It doesn't have that one important scene that makes it iconic. Sure, it has lots of great scenes, a couple of unexpected ones that thrilled me to the core but nothing that will ever elevate it to cult status, which is a terrible shame and a bit of missed opportunity. The script is ace, the cinematography brilliant (thanks to the great Bill Pope) and the direction, concept and acting all of the highest quality. It just doesn't have that scene people will be talking about for years, that scene that gets spoofed by The Wayan brothers or mocked in a Jason Friedberg/Aaron Seltzer movie. I don't think Baby Driver will ever have a cool alternative movie poster made of it, it's not the next Pulp Fiction or indeed, the next True Romance. I sound like I'm hating on it but I'm really not, what I'm trying to say is that it is in fact only a couple of tweaks away from being something of a modern masterpiece. There is certainly a lot more to it than you might expect and a lot more going on than the casual viewer might realize. I have to say I was very impressed with Ansel Elgort who I have thus far overlooked and Lily James is certainly going places fast, the role was originally meant for Emma Stone, and I'm sure she would have been good in it, but I'm glad James got it and she certainly gives it her all. Kevin Spacey is perfect in his role and I think more suited to it than Michael Douglas who was approached originally. I liked this version of Jon Hamm very much, he and Eiza González sizzle and Jamie Foxx makes for quite the effective and unpredictable bad guy.  It was also nice to see Flea in a small cameo appearance, his filmography is quite varied now as it is impressive. I'm quite excited about Edgar Wright's career now that all the Ant-Man upset is over, to be fair, there are many people who could have made Ant-Man as it was, but not many people who could have made Baby Driver the success it is.