Of all the great movies the Oscars have shunned over the years, Drive's snub in 2012 was a tough one to take.
Ryan Gosling stars as the Hollywood stuntman who moonlights as a getaway driver in his most mesmerising performance since he was a Jewish neo-Nazi in 2001's The Believer. Carey Mulligan is the struggling single mum who Gosling falls for, and a between-Breaking Bad seasons Bryan Cranston plays his mechanic partner in crime.
Nicolas Winding Refn's direction is suave and daring; he follows the
blood, sweat and tears of The Driver's journey with total badassness and
ends up with something in between Taxi Driver and Michael Mann's Thief... And then there's the soundtrack. What a soundtrack.
So when Radio 1 DJ Zane Lowe announced that he was curating a score of new music for the film masterpiece, you can understand the anger and confusion it sparked. But an improvement on the original is not what this is, Lowe insisted, and the project has been backed by Refn himself, who declared: "You can't own creativity. Rather than say [the movie is] mine, I'd prefer to say it's everyone else's."
Good idea or not, those who listen to music obsessive Lowe on the radio will know any re-soundtracking is in safe hands. It's a brave experiment and it's never been done before, so he and his pick of artists deserve points for having the bottle to even attempt this in the first place...
So when Radio 1 DJ Zane Lowe announced that he was curating a score of new music for the film masterpiece, you can understand the anger and confusion it sparked. But an improvement on the original is not what this is, Lowe insisted, and the project has been backed by Refn himself, who declared: "You can't own creativity. Rather than say [the movie is] mine, I'd prefer to say it's everyone else's."
Good idea or not, those who listen to music obsessive Lowe on the radio will know any re-soundtracking is in safe hands. It's a brave experiment and it's never been done before, so he and his pick of artists deserve points for having the bottle to even attempt this in the first place...
It's Eric Prydz's tense beats which start off
proceedings, trembling behind the rush of The Driver's first getaway we
see. The fizzing techno is a good match and the film is barely 10
minutes old before it feels different; sleek and modern in a fresh way. Chvrches
do the honours of scoring the opening credits, as their icy 'Get Away'
is set against the bright night lights of Downtown Los Angeles and
Gosling's mardy loner shadowing the streets - it all looks and sounds so
f**king cool.
Jon Hopkins, who made one of the albums of last year, has a strong presence throughout the whole movie. His beautiful, subtle ambience is so momentous he could probably make TOWIE half-watchable, but Drive is a perfect fit for him. Bring Me the Horizon, meanwhile, can be heard in the background of the pizzeria Shannon (Cranston) and Bernie (Albert Brooks) cunningly plot in, and this feels like a sweet achievement in itself for the metalcore rockers.
Aside from Kavinsky's 'Nightcall', the standout track on the original score was College & Electric Youth's 'A Real Hero'. The 1975 take their place here, wielding their customary picky guitars and sugary hooks on 'Medicine'. When The Driver's relationship with Irene (Mulligan) and her son Benicio (Kaden Loss) begins to blossom, The 1975 singer Matthew Healy's peppy vocals magnify the joy of the scene and you can easily imagine this as their next video - albeit a bloody expensive one to make.
The music never gets in the way of the film, just like the original, and that's what you want in a project like this. As Irene's husband Standard (Oscar Isaac) comes home from prison and confronts The Driver about his motives, there are no songs and all we get are Gosling's brooding looks and awkward silences. The story rightly isn't affected one bit.
It's SBTRKT who surrounds the movie's breaking point. Sitting sorrowfully by himself at a bar, The Driver tells some annoyance to "Shut your mouth or I'll kick your teeth down your throat and shut it for you", then it's not long before he realises his mission is to save Irene and Benicio, and in turn Irene's dickhead of a husband. Our chief was an outsider and now he has a purpose, and SBTRKT's pounding ambient house fuels the emotion thrillingly.
Bring Me the Horizon return for the nervy-as-hell robbery scene and, once Constance is shot dead, s**t hits the fan. The band's rough, ruminating rock arises for the car chase that follows, with Christina Hendricks' panicked Blanche in the backseat, and for a moment this becomes something of a Fast & Furious jolly. It's a fun sequence and, if anything, we want Bring Me's riffs even louder.
Jon Hopkins, who made one of the albums of last year, has a strong presence throughout the whole movie. His beautiful, subtle ambience is so momentous he could probably make TOWIE half-watchable, but Drive is a perfect fit for him. Bring Me the Horizon, meanwhile, can be heard in the background of the pizzeria Shannon (Cranston) and Bernie (Albert Brooks) cunningly plot in, and this feels like a sweet achievement in itself for the metalcore rockers.
Aside from Kavinsky's 'Nightcall', the standout track on the original score was College & Electric Youth's 'A Real Hero'. The 1975 take their place here, wielding their customary picky guitars and sugary hooks on 'Medicine'. When The Driver's relationship with Irene (Mulligan) and her son Benicio (Kaden Loss) begins to blossom, The 1975 singer Matthew Healy's peppy vocals magnify the joy of the scene and you can easily imagine this as their next video - albeit a bloody expensive one to make.
The music never gets in the way of the film, just like the original, and that's what you want in a project like this. As Irene's husband Standard (Oscar Isaac) comes home from prison and confronts The Driver about his motives, there are no songs and all we get are Gosling's brooding looks and awkward silences. The story rightly isn't affected one bit.
It's SBTRKT who surrounds the movie's breaking point. Sitting sorrowfully by himself at a bar, The Driver tells some annoyance to "Shut your mouth or I'll kick your teeth down your throat and shut it for you", then it's not long before he realises his mission is to save Irene and Benicio, and in turn Irene's dickhead of a husband. Our chief was an outsider and now he has a purpose, and SBTRKT's pounding ambient house fuels the emotion thrillingly.
Bring Me the Horizon return for the nervy-as-hell robbery scene and, once Constance is shot dead, s**t hits the fan. The band's rough, ruminating rock arises for the car chase that follows, with Christina Hendricks' panicked Blanche in the backseat, and for a moment this becomes something of a Fast & Furious jolly. It's a fun sequence and, if anything, we want Bring Me's riffs even louder.
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