MovieChat Forums > Drive (2011) Discussion > Did any else think this movie was needle...

Did any else think this movie was needlessly violent sometimes?


Now, I enjoy a good, shooter, bloody action movie. This however, shouldn't have been that movie. Now, I am not saying that people shouldn't die, but really? *beep* buckets of blood, that scene in the motel with the women's head exploding? It just seemed out of place and immature.

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Well, story goes, she gets a shotgun blast to the head.
Would you prefer just hearing the shot go off and maybe a glimpse of her lower half to let you know she's fallen over?
Or perhaps our main character can waltz over and let the audience know, "Hun... she's dead! Will you look at that!"?

I'm open to suggestions though...

We've met before, haven't we?

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I don't find the movie's violence unnecessary, and here's why: I see the entire feel/vibe of the film as symbolism for the character of the Driver. He's calm, collected, and quiet, but he's unquestioningly willing to be briefly and shockingly violent when he has to be. The film is very much the same way: its calm, retro feel is interrupted only a few brief times by jarring and graphic violence. It's symbolic of the way the Driver is willing to do anything to save the people he cares about, even become the bad guy. That's why he's a real hero, not some false standard of a macho superman like Americans expect-- because he's a real human being who will sacrifice everything, including his own innocence, to save the ones he loves. "Look at him- does he look like a good guy to you?" No- because the outer part, the mask, is that of a villain, while the love underneath must be kept hidden for the good of others.

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I agree, I think it was a great movie and beautifully shot, but I don't think the extremely graphic violence improved it. Sure those people had to die in the story but I think scenes like the girl in the bathroom were so graphic as to be almost ridiculous and it pulled me out of the movie a little.

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if anything it could have been more violent. there was nothing really to ron pearlman's death, that was actually disappointing to me. he has such a menace about him yet it was such a passive death. here's where someone tells me, that's what made it great...yeah yeah. i fugure, the guy's a "driver," so maybe you run pearlman down with the car 4, 5 times in the street. that would have fixed him extra good-like. i don't think the driver ran anybody down in the whole movie. wasted opportunity.

Larry Gaylord: "a billion people come in on a day off, and they don't flip out!"

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This film wasn't unnecessarily violent, I think the thing that provoked your response and mine is that the violence was poorly done. If you look at a Tarantino or Coen movie the violence is gritty, brutal and raw. But in Drive I think they focused too much on making it stylistic and 'artsy'to fit in with the aesthetics the rest of the film. If they'd made the violence a bit darker and less almost cartoonish it would have blended in and been organic as opposed to standing out so much and drawing away attention away from the film...

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immature? how so?
Heads explode when theyre shot at close range with a powerful shotgun, so not showing them exploding would have been altering reality. of course, we could have a guy shot brutally and yet only a trifle of blood leave his body, but that is, imho, very phony. we want the shots but, hey, dont show too much blood, its too real and spoils the action, because it reminds me that shooting someone has a nasty effect and that I should not enjoy watching such things

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I agree; the violence was excessive. Gave it a 7.5 instead of an 8 because of it.

"She let me go."
~White Oleander

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They were serious mobsters/gangsters who weren't afraid to use violence, and needed to silence everyone who knew about the robbery scheme. The violence seems worse as it often appears out of nowhere. The Driver knew what the guy in the lift was there for, so had to finish him off. As for Blanche, I imagine that's what a shotgun would do at close range.

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No. Violence is bloody. Most movies don't show the horror of violence. It is sanitized in most movies.

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