Baby Driver (2017)
★★★★½ — Baby Driver (2017)
Baby Driver arrived in the summer of 2017 as something of a rarity: a big, loud, crowd-pleasing action film that also happened to be made with genuine craft. The premise is straightforward enough, a young getaway driver coerced into the service of a crime boss finds himself caught up in a job that is never going to end well, but the execution is anything but routine. What sets the film apart is its central conceit: the protagonist drives, and indeed lives, to music, and the action sequences are choreographed beat-for-beat to a meticulously assembled soundtrack. It is the kind of idea that sounds gimmicky on paper and then turns out to be the whole point of the thing. The film was a considerable commercial success on its 2017 release, and it sparked the sort of word-of-mouth enthusiasm that gets people into cinemas twice.
Behind the camera is Edgar Wright, the British director who built his reputation on a string of genre films made with wit and formal precision. Wright had already demonstrated with Hot Fuzz and Shaun of the Dead that he is a filmmaker who thinks carefully about how editing and sound design can do comic and dramatic work simultaneously. Baby Driver is, in some respects, the fullest expression of that obsession: an entire feature built around the relationship between image and music. Produced with the backing of Working Title Films and MRC alongside Big Talk Studios, the film had the resources to stage its action sequences properly, and Wright used them. The result is polished but never cold, the kind of film that wears its enthusiasm on its sleeve without feeling sloppy about it.
In the lead role, Ansel Elgort plays Baby, the soft-spoken, headphone-wearing driver at the centre of the story. It is a performance that asks him to be present without being showy, to carry scenes largely through stillness and reaction, which is a harder trick than it sounds. Around him, the film assembles a varied and committed supporting cast. Lily James provides the emotional warmth that keeps the film from becoming purely kinetic. Jon Hamm is effective as the kind of man who presents well and turns nasty. Jamie Foxx brings an unpredictable, slightly unnerving energy to his role. And then there is Kevin Spacey, playing the crime boss with the particular brand of cool authority he has always done well. Whether that registers as an asset or a distraction may well depend on the viewer. For a comparison point in the crime genre, it is worth glancing at how a film like Fast X handles similar material: Baby Driver is considerably more interested in character than that franchise tends to be, and it shows.
As a shameless petrolhead this tickles all the right spots The lead, who I'd never see before this, does a great job of playing the clichéd "quiet, amazing driver with a heart and a tragic backstory" but it's also the cast around him that make this great. Every character fits. Every scene has it's place. It's soundtrack is great, the crime scenes are exciting. Honestly this is a purely fantastic film. Only marked it down from a 5* because Kevin Spacey is just soooo Kevin Spacey it does distract at times.
That note about Kevin Spacey is one I keep coming back to. There is no question the man can act, and the part is written for exactly his register, but there is something about his screen presence here that pulls focus in a way that is not always useful to the film. It is the one wrinkle in what is otherwise a pretty much perfectly assembled genre piece. The soundtrack alone is worth the price of admission, and the driving sequences have a kineticism that a lot of bigger, noisier action films would kill for. Sometimes a film just does what it sets out to do, and does it brilliantly. This is one of those.
Rating: ★★★★½ | Year: 2017 | Watched: 2025-05-11
Trailer
▶ Watch the official trailer for Baby Driver (2017) on YouTube
Where to watch
Watch in the UK
Stream: Netflix · Netflix Standard with Ads
Rent: Apple TV Store · Rakuten TV · Amazon Video · Google Play Movies
Buy: Apple TV Store · Rakuten TV · Amazon Video · Google Play Movies
Physical: Amazon UK · Zavvi
Watch in the US
Stream: fuboTV · Paramount Plus Premium · Paramount+ Amazon Channel · YouTube TV
Rent: Amazon Video · Apple TV Store · Google Play Movies · YouTube
Buy: Amazon Video · Apple TV Store · Google Play Movies · YouTube
Physical: Amazon US
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Related on Movies With Macca
More from Edgar Wright: Hot Fuzz (2007) · Shaun of the Dead (2004)
More from United Kingdom: Lessons of Darkness (1992) · Shinjuku Boys (1995) · The Curse of Frankenstein (1957) · Blue (1993)
More from the 2010s: Wonder (2017) · Beautiful Boy (2018) · The Witch (2015) · What We Do in the Shadows (2014)
More action: A Better Tomorrow (1986) · The General (1926) · Hand of Death (1976) · Daredevil (2003)
More crime: A Better Tomorrow (1986) · Angst (1983) · Stolen Face (1952) · Cairo Station (1958)
