First Look At Albert Brooks, Christina Hendricks, Ron Perlman, Bryan Cranston & Oscar Isaac
With the Cannes Film Festival right around the corner, one film we’re champing at the bit to hear and see more of, is Nicolas Winding Refn‘s latest effort, “Drive.”
Based on the novel by James Sallis, Refn’s reportedly lean-and-mean picture stars Ryan Gosling as Driver — a stunt driver moonlighting as a getaway-driver-for-hire who gets mixed up with the wrong people. We’ve already had our first glimpse at a few pictures and a 2-minute clip but now, thanks to the the film’s Cannes press kit, we have a handful of new images to admire, including first looks at many of the stellar supporting cast, like Albert Brooks, Christina Hendricks, Ron Perlman, Bryan Cranston and Oscar Isaac.
First up is Irene, played by rising British star Carey Mulligan. After a chance encounter between them, Driver and Irene’s relationship begins to flourish, and develops into a “‘Romeo And Juliet‘ kind of love story” — that is, of course, until Irene’ s husband Standard (described by actor Oscar Isaac as “someone who made some wrong decisions in his life, ending up in a bad place”) returns from prison early and is immediately threatened by Driver’s presence in his family’s life. Chaos is sure to ensue.
Driver’s back-up is his “part mentor, part manager” Shannon, played by “Breaking Bad” star Bryan Cranston. The actor was evidently Refn’s number one choice and was pursued aggressively for the role. “After we closed the financing, it was like ‘okay, who would I like in this movie besides Ryan?,’ and Bryan was someone that I went for like a hawk. Bryan is very much the kind of actor where it’s not just voice; it’s everything that comes with him,” Refn said.
Driver finds himself taking on Brooks’ antagonist Bernie Rose, reportedly a gangster-turned-potential-financial-backer for Driver’s racing ambitions. The role is described by Refn as “so violent [and] so dark” that he didn’t think Brooks would be interested, but the former comedy star agreed to jump into the spotlight anyway. Perlman, on the other hand, plays an acquaintance of Rose’s named Nino, described by Perlman as the dream role of “a Jewish man who wants to be an Italian gangster.” “Mad Men” star Hendricks has the mysterious “small but crucial” part of Blanche.
Having been floored by Refn’s last two efforts, “Bronson” and “Valhalla Rising,” we can’t wait for this one, particularly with this cast attached. Here’s the full synopsis and the cover of the press kit which may very well double as an early teaser poster.
DRIVE is the story of a Hollywood stunt driver by day, a loner by nature who moonlights as a top-notch getaway driver-for-hire in the criminal underworld. He finds himself a target for some of LA’s most dangerous men after agreeing to aid the husband of his beautiful neighbor, Irene. When the job goes dangerously awry, the only way he can keep Irene and her son alive is to do what he does best.
“Drive” premieres on the Croisette Friday week, May 20th.
Come on now we HAVE to know what the ban-worthy post said!!
Jessica Kiang is my idol.
@schoolmarm
You\’re right, \’volunteer\’ in no way suggests \’amateur\’. In fact, a lot of the time I would suggest that volunteers are the more engaged and the more dedicated, because what else do we get out of it? All I can say is that if you\’re seeing serial typos, you\’re either in a post we haven\’t got to yet (i.e. it\’s new up), or we somehow missed it, despite our best efforts (it\’s been up more than a couple of hours). If the latter is the case, drop us a comment letting us know and we\’ll take a look. If the former, please just bear with us. Believe me, as editors we take pride in our work and want our blog to be the best possible version of itself.
The debate about wanting to be first past the post on the internet is an ongoing one, but as long as we\’re a film news source and not a magazine blog, I fear we\’re stuck with this system. I can say that the features we run that are not news-reliant are all pre-edited by multiple editors, so we do it where we can.
And finally, as suggested below, Edward\’s comment about banning was not directed at you, but at a particularly ill-considered, now-deleted remark from another commenter. Your comment may have got our goat, but that\’s hardly a bannable offence (we\’d have no commenters left).
In any case, thank you for reading and responding to my reply. And without the snark this time, we\’re genuinely always looking for editors and you clearly care about this stuff, so while I may not have oversold the job, do think about it.
Hah! This is exactly like that bit in Fast Five where Vin Diesel offers arch enemy The Rock the arm-grab of brotherhood.
i\’m such a bitch ass.
@School Marm, What you\’re not seeing/reading is an egregious comment by one reader that was aimed at Jessica that was sexist, misogynist, etc.
We don\’t take kindly to shit laid on our frontdoor and we take it even less kindly when it\’s personally aimed at any one on our team.
Jessica,
As I said, I have enjoyed reading The Playlist for a long time. And maybe you\’re right, it is belittling to suggest that \’a cursory glance\’ is all your editors need give to a post.
I still think that volunteer writers (volunteer is not a synonym for amateur) could manage to rein in some of the more egregious typos. I\’m certainly not picking on this post. Reading back on what I wrote, it is a bit haughty.
There is also, on the internet, a tendency towards getting things up as quickly as possible, and I\’m sure that has a part to play here. So, apologies for insulting your work. I definitely didn\’t mean to imply that your work, or that of the editors, has no value, here. It is probably a testament to my frequent readership that I make it through a post before anyone has had a chance to fix it.
One last thing though, for Edward, banning someone for what was intended to be constructive criticism is extreme and unfair.
@Jessica, you are awesome.
Not cool dude. If you\’re looking to get yourself banned, you\’re going about it the right way.
@Schoolmarm
You know what\’s useful? When a commenter politely points out to us that a particular post appears to have been overlooked by the editing team (yes we have editors – a whole team of them, though \”hiring\” is misleading as we are all volunteers). Because while we try to get to posts quickly after they go live (we mostly cannot pre-edit), sometimes things fall through the cracks. The above post did have typing errors in it that were missed, so we\’ve taken another look at it.
You know what\’s NOT useful? Telling us with an air of world-weary superiority that a \”cursory glance\” over the posts would make your reading experience so much better, when it should be pretty clear that most of the time our posts benefit from quite a bit more than a cursory glance.
So you think we need a new editor? Actually we\’re always on the lookout for them. Simply hit \”contact us\” and we\’d be delighted to consider your application. The perks of the job: no salary, no bonus and all the satisfaction of knowing no one gives a shit when you do your job well, but miss a couple of typos and the whole internet gets to weigh in on how you should be fired. From your job that doesn\’t pay.
Great to have you aboard!
love that Oscar Isaac is part of this great cast!
\’CHAMPING\’ at the bit ffs
Love Christina Hendricks, very attractive and sexy.
Can\’t wait for this, the clip from Cannes had me craving more.
*masturbates*
Real cinema.