Review of Baby Driver (2017) by Chris L — 04 Jul 2017

Edgar Wright's first film that hasn't been styled as a comedy (and his first since 'The World's End'), 'Baby Driver' is a fast-paced crime caper, with plenty of car chases, action, gun fights and a great soundtrack. There's almost no score - basically every scene is set to a song, starting with the first robbery (Jon Spencer Blues Explosion), "Tequila", T. Rex, The Damned, "Easy" and Baby (Elgort)'s own mixes. Music is so important to him, as he has tinnitus and uses an iPod to drown it out - and help him focus on his getaway driving.

Baby is helping criminals get away with robberies to pay back crime boss Doc (Spacey - always good), and the first crew is Buddy (Hamm - great as the criminal with an almost-conscience), Darling (Gonzalez - mostly just eye candy) and Griff (Bernthal - gruff). Then he falls in love with Debora (James - cute), a waiter at an Atlanta diner and needs to extricate himself from this shady world. This is made harder when Bats (Foxx - crazy) gets involved and doesn't like Baby always wearing earplugs.

The car chases are filmed/edited magnificently, with the music adding urgency and tone where needed. Nowhere is this more evident than the final scene, with Queen's "Brighton Rock" (one of their less famous songs) seamlessly complementing the visual. The stakes are high for the final 30min and the ending is appropriate and not corny. There's plenty of style, but also substance, here.