Driver

Action specialist Walter Hill is in his element here with this tense, entertaining thriller that he both wrote and directed. Ryan O'Neal stars as a getaway driver for hire, who is hounded by offbeat detective Bruce Dern. Dern is dying to righteously bust O'Neal for something, but O'Neal is simply very good at his job. The detective will resort to any method necessary, but the driver is smart and seemingly always one step ahead of him.

One can hardly fail to notice the way that Hill deliberately doesn't personalize his characters too much, giving them descriptions or nicknames rather than proper names. And with the help of his very able cast, they create some very good character moments that are the real meat of this story. Its car chases are among the best you'll see in this genre, but serve to support the story instead of the story setting up the action set pieces. Hill again recalls styles from films of earlier decades - while, for example, his "Streets of Fire" was an ode to '50s rock 'n'roll, this film does owe a fair bit to the film noir of the '40s.

The people who populate this story are often all business, especially The Driver, who lives by his own code. There are things he'll do and things he won't do. Among other things, he employs a "witness" (French beauty Isabelle Adjani) and works with a "connection" (Ronee Blakley) who comes to him with job offers. The actors are all great, with the supporting cast also including Matt Clark and Felice Orlandi as Derns' fellow detectives, Joseph Walsh and Rudy Ramos as thieving lowlifes, and Bob Minor & Peter Jason in bit parts.

This tale is taut and convincing, told in a straightforward yet compelling manner; technically it's expertly done, with excellent editing by Tina Hirsch & Robert K. Lambert, cinematography by Philip H. Lathrop, and music by Michael Small. Hill's screenplay is full of interesting dialogue, especially in exchanges between Dern and Clark.

Hill has certainly done many fine and entertaining movies over the years, but this is one that tends to get overshadowed by his bigger hits such as "48 Hrs". It's a little gem worthy of discovery or re-discovery.

Eight out of 10.

Less is more: a superb existential thriller to rival Point Blank and car chases to equal The French Connection, along with a couple of outstanding performances from the leads.

Here, the underworld's most talented getaway driver (O'Neal) is obsessively pursued by a corrupt, power-mad cop (Dern), who'll stop at nothing to catch him - even if it means blackmailing a seedy gang of bank robbers to help lure him into a trap. Aiding The Driver (these are characters who don't need names) is the beautiful and enigmatic Player (Adjani), who helps double-cross The Detective.

Walter Hill once mused that all his movies, like those of fellow director John Carpenter, were really westerns in disguise; hence the cowboy hats, Winchester rifles and, er, cowboys in the case of The Long Riders - which crop up repeatedly in his pictures. (Although where that leaves Brewster's Millions is anybody's guess.) The Driver, originally devised as a vehicle for Steve McQueen, is no exception: if O'Neal's country music-loving driver is referred to as 'The Cowboy', Dern, who once received death threats for killing John Wayne on screen, plays his twitching, preening nemesis like every crooked sheriff from Rio Lobo to Unforgiven.

Everybody is A Man (or Woman) With No Name - archetypes defined by their roles ('The Player', 'The Connection'), existing purely to drive the plot forward. O'Neal plays the eponymous anti-hero as half-man, half-automobile, speaking only when absolutely necessary - "Get in", "Go home" - expending just the right amount of energy to get the job done, as evinced by three of the most incredible car chases in cinema. (Hill's previous work as assistant director on Bullitt obviously stood him in good stead here).

As with Jim Jarmusch's Ghost Dog: The Way of the Samurai, or Jean-Pierre Melville's Le Samourai, which The Driver most resembles, nothing is wasted. "How do we know you're that good?" asks a doubtful crime baron, on procuring The Driver's services. O'Neal's unspoken reply providing rare light relief, as with casual insouciance and surgical precision, he reduces the dismayed owner's Mercedes to jigsaw pieces against an underground car park's concrete pillars to display his credentials.

Like a manic mechanic, Hill similarly strips the story - part-action thriller, part-existential noir - back to its essence, siphoning off dialogue, back story, character development and love interest, until only the Zen flesh and bones remain.

The Driver is a stylish, detached and antisocial tribute to driving for the sake of driving and crime for the sake of crime, made at a time when those things still had a palpable meaning for most big-city Americans. The writer/director is Walter Hill, penner of the not too dissimilar cult film The Getaway a few years earlier. And although he made more successful films later on (notably 48 Hrs.), The Driver is arguably among his most gutsy and hard-hitting. It's worth a watch for the fervour it represents and instils, if nothing else. Ryan O'Neal, Bruce Dern and Isabelle Adjani are the attractive trio of lead actors.

The Driver (1978)

Walter Hill's underrated film may have been forgotten completely had it not been for the success of the "Driver" series of Playstation games on which this film is a massive influence. Ryan O'Neal plays the Driver, a ronin-like character, willing to act as an unbeatable getaway driver for anyone as long as the price is right because, well...it's what he does. Bruce Dern is the Cop set on finally catching the elusive criminal, even if it means aiding and abetting criminal activity himself.

This most reminded me of Michael Mann's crime films from the 80s onwards such as "Thief" and "Heat" - Hill's film shares the same kind of existentialist themes about identity - men defined and ruled by their actions, to the extent that they have no room in their lives for anything else. It also shares Mann's style - creating an urban environment that's both chic, yet realistically gritty.

Ryan O'Neal may not have quite the cult status of Steve McQueen but his portrayal of the Driver as an empty, emotionless human being is strengthened through the characters sheer self-confidence and survival instinct. Bruce Dern gives the Cop a nice contrast to his lifeless target, bringing a kind of goofy, obsessive tenacity, as he sets up a bank job with some petty criminals in his attempt to be the first cop to catch the Driver. Isabelle Adjani is strikingly vacant, although her role in the proceedings is far from well defined.

It has to be said that the car chases are brilliant - from the opening getaway police chase to the Driver's calculated destruction of a very shiny Mercedes in an underground parking lot and the final cat and mouse game in a labyrinthine warehouse. The dramatic scenes do inevitably feel a bit sluggish sometimes and the constant hard-boiled dialogue does start to grate. Despite a seemingly sparse, clear-cut plot there are moments towards the climax which are confusing and frustrating.

The existential aspect of the plot is emphasised with a complete absence of character names, so maybe it is fitting that the film, and it's central character, only really comes alive during the car chase scenes - though this may be very relevant to the film's philosophy it does limit the sheer entertainment value as those looking for constant thrills, which the film does deliver, may find the wait between them in such a barren landscape a little tedious while armchair philosophers may find the existential "coolness" forced.

THE DRIVER (4+ outta 5 stars) Classic, no-nonsense, action-chase movie about a professional getaway driver (Ryan O'Neal) and the obsessed cop (Bruce Dern) who is determined to see him behind bars. Terrific chase scenes highlight this unjustly-neglected modern day film noir. No one plays nutty, obsessed characters quite like Bruce Dern. Ryan O'Neal as the bad guy/hero shows even less emotion than he did in Kubrick's "Barry Lyndon"... he's often accused of non-acting but I think his low-key, taciturn performance here is mesmerizing. He may as well be driving down to the corner store for a carton of milk rather than eluding a dozen speeding police cars. Isabelle Adjani doesn't really have much to do in this movie but look beautiful... but I guess that's enough. There is not a lot of dialogue and not a lot of character development. The characters in this movie aren't even given names! They are merely listed as The Driver, The Detective, The Player, The Connection, etc. This is a real high point in the career of director Walter Hill. He may have had more financial success with "The Warriors" and "48 Hours" but I think this is his best, most fully realized action movie.