Feature

The woman suing Drive for its lack of driving: The wisecracks

A litigious moviegoer is miffed that the smart Ryan Gosling heist thriller pales in comparison to the Fast and the Furious-style blockbuster she was anticipating

Drive, the critically praised Ryan Gosling thriller about a Hollywood stuntman who moonlights as a getaway car driver, is many things: A love story, a heist film, an operatic gore-fest. Another installment of the oft-derided Fast and the Furious car racing series, however, it is not. And that's making one moviegoer quite angry. Michigan resident Sarah Deming is suing the studio that distributed Drive and the theater where she saw it, claiming that trailers sold the film as a Fast and the Furious-like blockbuster. Instead, she complains, the movie "bore very little similarity to a chase, or race action film… having very little driving." (She also rather oddly complains that the film is anti-Semitic.) Critics, particularly those who loved the film, have been quick to label the lawsuit "frivolous" and "stupid." Here, some of the best quips:

The end of Hollywood
Should Deming's lawsuit succeed, says Lauri Apple at Gawker, the new precedent might "put Hollywood out of business! Nothing wrong with that outcome."

Compare and contrast
We actually watched both trailers, says Oliver Lyttleton at Indie Wire. "Not a lot of opera in that Fast Five trailer, is there?" This lawsuit will obviously fail, but "maybe there's someone that Deming can sue" for her own terrible taste.

Finally!
"This is a fantastic development in the history of Hollywood," says MaryAnn Johanson at Flick Filosopher, "and is sure to ensure us better, more entertaining, and more vehicular-explosiony movies in the future."

Enough is enough
"There have already been five installments in the F&F franchise that, with the exception of the mind-blowing art of Tokyo Drift, are pretty much interchangeable," says Scott Marks at San Diego Reader. "Is there really someone out there begging for more?"

Change we can believe in
 Finally, someone is taking studios to task for releasing misleading trailers, says Jen Chaney at The Washington Post. "For everyone who ever went to see Knight & Day expecting a medieval romance, was disappointed to find out that Rio wasn't a Duran Duran biopic, or thought that Abduction wouldn't stink" — well, folks, "this is your Erin Brockovich moment."

Recommended

New movies to watch in June
Movies.
Briefing

New movies to watch in June

The daily gossip: May 31, 2023
Al Pacino
Daily gossip

The daily gossip: May 31, 2023

The end of 'Ted Lasso'?
Ted Lasso
Feature

The end of 'Ted Lasso'?

America's most surprising banned books
Harry Potter
Feature

America's most surprising banned books

Most Popular

Air New Zealand to weigh international passengers as part of safety survey
An Air New Zealand plane takes off from Sydney, Australia.
Step on the Scale

Air New Zealand to weigh international passengers as part of safety survey

Thousands flock to Missouri to see body of nun who died in 2019
People wait in line to see the exhumed body of Sister Wilhelmina Lancaster.
drawing a crowd

Thousands flock to Missouri to see body of nun who died in 2019

Biden's reelection calculus
President Joe Biden
Briefing

Biden's reelection calculus