Drive Hard

Starring: John Cusack, Thomas Jane, Zoe Ventoura, Christopher Morris, Yesse Spence
Directed by: Brian Trenchard-Smith
Rating: Not rated
Genre: Action, Comedy, Crime
2014

Times Seen:
Tim: 1

Summary: A criminal (John Cusack) forces a former race car driver (Thomas Jane) to drive his getaway car after stealing $9 million.

Review:

Tim: Drive Hard is a terrible movie. There's really no other way to say it. That surprises me a little, because I was looking forward to the pairing of John Cusack and Thomas Jane. Plus, who doesn't love a fun getaway movie? About halfway through the film, I looked up the director and was horrified he directed both Leprechaun 3 and Leprechaun 4: In Space (both direct-to-video films), I realized why this movie was so bad. I cant believe anyone signed on to this film knowing Brian Trenchard-Smith was in the director's chair.

I thoroughly blame Trenchard-Smith for this disaster of a movie. The guy clearly has zero talent as a director. This movie is laughably bad from start to finish. It felt like he limited his actors to one take, no matter how godawful that take was. This film is so, so bad. There's no real character development, the cast isn't believable in the least, and a great deal of the dialogue feels like it was ab libbed by people who desperately needed a script.

John Cusack is the best part of the movie and this is one of his worst performances. It was forced, impossible to believe and at times just plain silly. He has a very few good moments but mostly this is a performance I bet he'd like to forget. Thomas Jane is even worse. It was almost as if he was purposely giving a terrible performance. I know Jane has talent, but none of it is on display here. His performance is laughably bad. I never believed him as a character for a single second. The rest of the cast is likewise bad, a collection of talentless bums who just waste their screen time.

This movie is bad that it almost feels like this was an unintentional comedy. It's not funny, but it's so bad, it feels like someone said, "Let's just call it a comedy to explain all these moronic scenes!" There were a few moments when the ridiculousness of the whole thing was entertaining. Even though they were horribly hampered by a hack director, I did enjoy some of the back-and-forth between Cusack and Jane. I do genuinely like both these actors. Part of me was happy to see them together, part of me was disappointed that this was the film we got with them.

Drive Hard might have had some potential, but with an awful script and a terrible director, there's really no reason for anyone to see this movie ever. It's a complete and utter waste of time.

Rating 1-10
Tim's Rating: 4.5



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