Driven

Ladies and gentlemen, this is a long review, but it is not long enough to catalogue all of "Driven"'s flaws. I would explore more of the flaws below, but frankly I just want to forget I ever saw this film. I thought of this a while ago, and resolved to do it only when absolutely necessary, but: Reading this review constitutes an agreement not to see this film. If you see this film and suffer any pain, suffering or other injury because of it, I am not liable for said pain, suffering or injury. You have been warned.

Why do scriptwriters and directors feel the need to attempt to put real characters into action films? Action films, with very few exceptions, don't tell truths about the human condition. Action stars generally can't act, action plots do not embrace the realism necessary to tell truths, and action direction is more concerned with wowing the audience than instructing it. An action film dominated by misguided character development ends up not being action-oriented, and not dramatic either, but rather bizarrely incoherent: the type of mess that results when two incompatible philosophies collide at high speed.

Such a car wreck of a film is "Driven," scripted and produced by Sylvester Stallone and directed by Renny Harlin. Its previews promise lap after lap of throttle-opening action, and there is some good Formulaic 1 footage in this film. However, most of this film's two hours is spent trying to divine the mysteries of its charcters' souls. Since there are precious few such mysteries, and since Stallone and Harlin are ill-equipped to explore the mysteries that are actually there, what we get are vast stretches of tedious exposition, characters behaving inexplicably, and frequent monologues of cringe-inducing inanity, occasionally spiked by too-short spurts of metal-crunching violence. If that sounds like an unappealing combination, to use the film's slogan, welcome to the human race.

Jimmy Bly (Kip Pardue), a "young rookie" (in the film's phrase), has made a nice start towards taking the championship of an unnamed open-car racing league from ice-cold German Beau Brandenburg (Til Schweiger). However, Bly begins to crack under the pressure from Brandenburg's still-rapacious pursuit and from his avaricious agent-brother DeMille (Robert Sean Leonard).

Carl Henry (Burt Reynolds), owner of Bly's car, brings in Joe Tanto (Stallone) to try to straighten the kid out, on the theory that only someone who burned out as spectacularly as Tanto apparently did could teach someone else how to avoid burning out spectacularly.

There are also some random attractive women in the film, including Sophia (Estella Warren), who gets dumped by Brandenburg and pursued by Bly; Lucretia (Stacy Edwards), a reporter who's exploring male-dominated sport but spends all her time captivated by dominating male Tanto; and Cathy (Gina Gershon), Tanto's ex-wife, who spends her time being shrew-tacular.

Even though this plot has at least three characters too many, it could still be the basis for a decent film. However, Stallone has written this film such that the only characters who avoid doing inexplicably stupid things are Brandenburg, Sophia and Tanto. In Tanto's case, the sane behavior is a front for Sly the human, who wishes to use Tanto to impart the wisdom he himself gained after being a famous actor who used his fame to make incredibly bad films. The intention shows, the philosophy Stallone spews is none too insightful, and his paternalistic tone grates.

Stallone uses the other characters to stack the deck for himself, sanity-wise. Why doesn't Jimmy just fire his brother when he haughtily insists that Jimmy cede all authority to him? (For that matter, how did two parents name one of their sons "Jimmy" and the other "DeMille"?) Why does Carl threaten to fire Jimmy if he doesn't win his last race, although Jimmy at that point is the second-ranked driver in the world? Why does Carl deliver this threat to Tanto instead of Jimmy?

Why does Jimmy respond to all this pressure by driving a test car at 195 mph down Michigan Avenue in the beautiful city of Chicago? Why is it that the lecture Tanto gives Jimmy after this little spree, which is exactly like all Tanto's other lectures in that it is composed primarily of self-help-class bromides, makes such an impression that Jimmy immediately starts driving better? And why does Lucretia fall in love with Tanto? Does she realize that they don't have time to have a romance, but they'd better do it anyway, because Tanto needs someone to kiss at the end of the film?

"Driven"'s main failures fall at the feet of Sly Stallone, but Renny Harlin needs to step up to take some blame as well. Harlin has given us some awful films over the years, but his ability to direct action is undisputed. Harlin does, in fact, provide truly special effects at some points; he makes the Chicago chase so fun that questions about its pointlessness almost disappear, and throughout he takes pleasure in showing incredibly destructive high-speed crashes in super-slo-mo, often computer-animating the individual flying parts of the dismembered car, to good effect.

However, Harlin is mostly called on here to direct people talking, which he cannot do. He lets the pulse of the film die away completely every time it leaves the racetrack. He resorts to lazy information-providing devices like sportscaster voiceovers and montages, which make exposition even more of a chore than it has to be. (The montage that begins this film, with its clipped newspaper headlines, limp voiceovers and lifeless editing, has to be the lamest action film beginning in many a moon.) He lets his actors fall on their faces with overemoted sermons and outbursts; Burt Reynolds would not have been allowed by a competent director to make such an incredibly hammy mess out of his big speech to Tanto.

Lots of films are bad. If you watch movies, you know this. But very few films manage to be so bad that they're actually insulting. "Driven" does. Don't be tempted by the shiny sheetmetal in "Driven"'s previews. Just walk off the lot. There's a bomb waiting to go off if you turn the ignition.

OKAY, ONE MORE FLAW

Renny Harlin's primary method of differentiating the racecourses in this film is showing this set of four women with amazing assets (hereinafter referred to as "T&A vehicles") wearing clothing emblazoned with the names of different sponsors. In a nod to diversity, the T&A vehicles at the Tokyo Speedway are, in fact, Japanese. Otherwise, the T&A vehicles have no special connection of any kind to the raceway; they're just there. So are all the other gratuitous T&A shots. By the fifth time the T&A vehicles came on the screen, I was laughing uproariously. Not that I don't enjoy extreme babeage, but seriously, I don't think I've ever seen a film that surpassed "Driven" for gratuitous inclusion of attractive females.

BTW, this should not be taken as a reason to see this film. "Josie and the Pussycats" is a better T&A film, and a better film too. Stay away from this one. I take no further responsibility.

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