What’s this all about?
When a cult leader, who may or may not have super powers, decides to sacrifice the baby that he fathered with a woman who bit him on the penis to the devil, in an attempt to “bring hell to Earth,” that baby’s grandpa escapes from hell and violently kills a bunch of trashy goons with the help of a trailer park tramp and her financed 1977 Dodge Charger. A supernatural accountant also slaughters a ton of people, and has a magic coin that can turn into an FBI badge (but nothing else, apparently).
Yes. Really.
Drive Angry is a weird movie. It feels like a 70’s exploitation flick, but with a big budget. Everything’s dirty. All of the people are trashy. The plot is as bare bones as they come. Most of the film is made up of graphic violence and over-the-top stunt set pieces.
Who is Nick in this one?
Nick plays “Milton,” a former criminal of some sort who has been trapped in hell (presumably for his crimes). While there, he learns that his daughter’s daughter is to be sacrificed to the devil, so he escapes from Hell. How this is accomplished is never revealed. Nick vassalates between intense, broody Nick, and Nick-pretending-to-be-an-alien-disguised-as-a-human. There’s almost no actual acting in this movie, so Nick does OK, I guess.
Who else is in this one?
Amber Heard (Seemed like a real POS in that Johnny Depp trial; probably in other movies, but I haven’t seen them) plays “Piper,” a truck stop waitress who is engaged to Great Value Stone Cold Steve Austin. When she learns that he’s cheating on her, she goes on the run with Nick, and does a bunch of trashy, slutty stuff, like prostituting herself for a hotel room. I’m not sure if we’re supposed to like Piper, or not.
William Fichtner (Armageddon) plays “The Accountant,” a servant of the devil who is trying to return Milton to hell. Honestly, he steals every scene he’s in.
David Morse (“George Washington” in John Adams) plays “Webster,” an old friend of Milton’s who seems unsurprised that he’s no longer dead. I guess this stuff happens to him a lot. His character seems to exist only to provide some exposition and to provide a replacement car to the main characters. It’s a real waste.
Kady Mixon (East Bound and Down) has a bit role as a horny truck stop waitress. She’s wasted here.
Charlotte Ross (“Eve Donovan” on Days of our Lives) plays another horny truck stop waitress (at a different truck stop). If I had a nickel for every horny truck stop waitress in this movie, I’d only have three nickels, but it’s weird that they put three of them in here, right?
Did you see that?
The evil cult leader villain carries a cane made from a human femur, which we later learn is Nick’s daughter’s femur. Am I the only one who sees the obvious problem with using a femur as a cane? Unless Nick’s daughter was nine feet tall, her femur isn’t going to be anywhere near long enough to touch the ground from where a normal person would hold it. Why didn’t he just make a necklace out of her teeth or something if he wanted to look evil? -Michael
There was a flash back towards the beginning of the movie of some sort of Jim Jones sort of character slicing the neck of Nick’s daughter, whom had done something unpleasant to the Jim Jones wanna be. I think involving his dick, but to be honest the flashback was so disjointed it was hard to follow. Anyways, when he slit her throat an oddly large amount of “blood” flung onto the wall next to her. Let’s set aside where the blood hit in relation to the neck slicing and let’s also set aside the amount of blood. I’d like to point out that that blood was chunky. I think they might have actually thrown a 16oz glass of half set strawberry jello on the wall next to her. – Sarah
What were Nick’s best parts?
Nick’s performance is not the worst thing in this movie. Still, it’s hard to pinpoint a specific scene as his “best.” He’s basically playing “too cool to get excited about anything” the whole movie. He doesn’t get emotional when talking about his daughter or family, he never looks scared, and he never looks excited.
There is one exchange between him and the accountant in which they are bickering through the open windows of moving cars. The whole conversation really feels like petty carping between coworkers who don’t like each other. It’s delivered well by both actors, and achieves the juxtaposition of the over-the-top action and the petty bitching that I assume the director was after. -Michael
In the scene where The Accountant is chasing Nick and his girl, their cars are side by side and they start talking with each other as if they are just standing there. The scene is ridiculous, right in line with most of the movie, but the banter between them is absolutely perfectly done. It fully shows how well and long they’ve known each other, how much they irritate and disdain each other. Plus there’s sarcastic humor to boot. I loved it! -Sarah
What were Nick’s worst parts?
There’s an absolutely bizarre scene in which Nick is “having sex” with Eve Donovan from Days of Our Lives. I put that in quotes, because throughout the scene, Nick sits upright in bed, fully dressed, wearing sunglasses and smoking a cigar while the nude woman writhes on top of him. He is completely still and lifeless. When the woman asks him why he doesn’t take off his clothes, he says, robotically, “I never disrobe before a gunfight.”
Of course, a gunfight immediately breaks out, and the two continue having sex during the entire thing.
It’s unclear how Nick knew his attackers were coming (or how he has sex with his pants on). He doesn’t have magic powers or anything. Also, he doesn’t talk like an emotionless robot in the rest of the movie. Why do it here? The whole scene is played as a wild joke, and it would have been much funnier if Nick was actually, you know, doing something. -Michael
Don’t get me wrong, this film was full of bad scenes, but I find it hard to pick one because I found them all horrible and also awesome. Since what made most of them so great was their campy nature and over the top ridiculousness, I’m going to pick the one serious scene at the end that wasn’t campy or ridiculous. The scene where Nick hold his grand daughter and gives her to our heroine to raise. It wasn’t actually all that badly acted by Nick, especially given the rest of the movie, but it was serious too long and felt out of place with the rest of the film. -Sarah
How was the movie?
I feel like Sarah and I are going to disagree about this movie, and then cite the same things for why it’s bad/good.
From my standpoint, it’s an absolutely absurd movie with a plot that feels like it was written by a 13-year-old who was equal parts “hardcore” and horny. The characters are all super trashy, with no redeeming qualities. The gore is ridiculous (Nick seems to have only taken the role because he liked the idea of playing a character with a bullet lodged in his eye). The physics are nonexistent (at one point Nick shoots a standing man with a shotgun, and that man flies backwards, feet first, through a nearby window). Several characters seem to have literally no motivation.
If some film school kids made this movie on a shoestring budget, it would be an instant cult classic. As it was, though, this movie was made by Hollywood professionals with $50 million dollars. To me, it lacks the charm and ingenuity of a grindhouse exploitation film, and as such, just feels flat.
This movie cost about $50 million to make, and brought in less than $11 million domestically, and another $30 million overseas. -Michael
The movie was absolutely horrible, but in a fantastic way. It was absolutely a so bad that it’s good movie. It’s like it was written by a 5 year old in the 90’s who then was able to make it when they grew up. I’m guessing they were hoping to be a cult classic. It’s too bad it didn’t take. I did enjoy the effort. -Sarah
Yeah, but did you like it?)
The movie had its moments, but overall, there were just too many eyeroll inducing moments for me to really enjoy it. I’d rather watch it than Ghost Rider, but I’d rather have a colonoscopy than watch Ghost Rider. -Michael
I loved it! I thoroughly enjoyed watching it and would watch it again. -Sarah
Where can I watch it?
It’s free on Pluto TV.
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