Don't believe the Hype

Rating: 2/10 (5 July 2017)

I may have been more generous with the rating I chose, however due to the overwhelming number of highly positive reviews, I feel that some brutal honesty is required here.
The main themes in most of the reviews I've stumbled across are that this movie has a refreshingly original story and that the car chase scenes were exceptional. Neither circumstance holds true. The story was as cut and dry as any in this genre and the car chase scenes were bland, boring, and made no sense to me. Compared to a movie like Drive, where the protagonist's backstory actually lends to his driving skills (stunt car driver, motorsports participant), in Baby Driver, we're supposed to believe that some kid somehow acquired exceptional getaway driver abilities because of...tinnitus? There is no connection here, not to me anyway. And as for the chase scenes, utterly boring and unoriginal. The cars were completely lame too. Taking Drive as a point of contention again, the cars in Drive even have some degree of backstory to make the seemingly unbelievable chase scenes more believable...upgraded chassis, suspension, and souped up engines. In Baby Driver, we're given nothing more than showroom stock grocery getters...not even the top end models of the cars were chosen to take on the challenges. It was just all around stupid to me and I was left disappointed.
OK so the soundtrack was good. But this is not Forrest Gump where a compelling, original story is amplified by a perfectly curated soundtrack. Instead, it's a collection of good music used in campy fashion. If what you're after is the soundtrack, get a Spotify account. Dollar for dollar you'll get a lot more out of it, I promise.