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Driven

2001, Movie, PG-13, 115 mins

Driven: Review

DRIVEN
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As hollow and fundamentally false as a video driving game, this noisy, time-wasting spectacle is crammed with what purports to be characters, except that not one of them has any more depth than will fit into a one-line description. Puppyish newcomer Jimmy Bly (Kip Pardue) has the raw talent to be a champion, but chokes under pressure. His sleek brother and business manager DeMille (Robert Sean Leonard) is a manipulative weasel. Leathery old-timer Joe Tanto (Stallone), who screwed up his own career, wants to help the rookie avoid making the same mistakes. Bly's chief competitor, high-cheekboned Beau Brandenberg (Til Schweiger), looks like an ice man but is really driving scared. Wheelchair-bound team owner Carl Henry (Burt Reynolds), a former driver, accepts nothing less than 150% from his able-bodied employees. So-called journalist Lucretia "Luc" Jones (Stacy Edwards, who was so extraordinary in IN THE COMPANY OF MEN) flirts with Joe. The film follows one grueling, crash-filled season that separates the boys from the men, or something like that. A labor of love for screenwriter and star Stallone, the film nevertheless looks like a hugely cynical mix of computer effects-heavy action sequences punctuated by scenes in which people hurl clichés of the "You're going down in flames and you're not taking me with you!" variety at each other. Or perhaps it's just monumentally inept; in any event, if this is the end result of 37 script revisions, as Harlin has claimed in interviews, it boggles the mind to imagine earlier drafts. The young actors struggle mightily to make something of their underwritten roles, but there's nothing for them to work with; far more seasoned performers would be stymied. The newcomers are further hampered by the fact that they all either look like every fresh piece of grist for the Hollywood mill or, worse, distractingly like someone else: Schweiger is a ringer for the young John Savage, while Cristián de la Fuente bears a striking resemblance to the youthful Jean Claude Van Damme. It's enough to make you grateful for the instantly recognizable corporate logos splashed across the front of their racing suits. It's also hard to imagine a four-and-a-half hour version of this juvenile nonsense, but apparently Harlin assembled one that was, mercifully, pared down to a numbing two hours. leave a comment --Maitland McDonagh
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Driven to Darkness: Jewish Emigre Directors and the Rise of Film Noir
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