The Town Meets The Straight Story

Rating: 2/10 (20 September 2011)

I'm at a loss when I see the general user community rate "Drive" with well over an 8 average rating. My summary says it best; this movie was like taking 'The Town' and slowing it down as much as possible making it seem like the 'Straight Story'. There are many scenes where at least 15 seconds (feels like 30) pass without much of any movement on the screen and no dialogue. Two hours of this and you feel like you're watching still photos instead of a real movie. I get the attempt at an artistic angle here, but staring at Ryan Gosling's face for what seemed like 45 minutes of this movie gets old fast. Plus, (spoiler) the random, gruesome murders don't fit the overall slow plodding feel of the movie. What's worse, is the plot seemed like a close sibling/rip-off to 'The Town' but with a worse ending. Actually, the movie ends worse off than it began without much of a point. The 'action' scenes were displayed to try and be intense; but left you thinking there was more that wasn't to be. Ryan Gosling had maybe 40 lines of dialogue and about two expressions, so trying to spin this as 'artistic' is purely euphemistic. Thus, my message to the general user community is - what were you thinking?