petrolheads and cinephiles alike.
Few things are as cinematic as
a well staged car chase, and in
recent decades we’ve seen very
few well staged car chases.
When its leading man isn’t
strutting his stuff, either on foot
or behind the wheel, Baby Driver
begins to lag. Sadly Wright’s tal-
ents as a director aren’t matched
feels forced and awkward. More
genuine are the scenes in which
Baby is mocked for his obses-
sion, as though Wright is draw-
ing on his past life as a geek
growing up in an era when you
were considered a freak for in-
dulging in less than mainstream
pursuits - listening to music
that’s too old, watching movies
When its leading man isn’t strutting his stuff, either on
foot or behind the wheel, Baby Driver begins to lag.
by his writing skills, and the dia-
logue is often cringe-worthy, a
poor British imitation of Ameri-
can street lingo that comes off as
a second rate Tarantino knockoff.
The characters are paper thin,
especially Debora, yet another
manic pixie male fantasy who
seems to have no defining per-
sonality beyond a knowledge
of obscure music. The relation-
ship between herself and Baby
NJ STAGE 2017 - Vol. 4 No. 6
that are too weird, or reading
books with too many words.
If Baby Driver does a better job
than La La Land of homaging the
joys of the Hollywood musical, it
unfortunately shares that film’s
uncomfortable racial elements.
Despite being set in Atlanta, a
city where more than half the
population is African-American,
black faces are all too notice-
ably largely absent. Only two get
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