Nobody Gonna Steal My Head Now That I'm On The Road Again

Drive (Winding Refn, 2011)

I love driving. I don't enjoy gas prices or the idea of potentially stepping into a metallic death trap each time I get behind the wheel, but there's an undeniable allure for me of being insulated in a world full of music. A personal retreat for my mind. It is with this attitude that I approached Drive, Nicolas Winding Refn's Cannes award winning art house affair that chronicles an episode in a nameless driver's life. Here's the thing though, I don't really care for cars all that much. So as the film started playing I really was unsure exactly what I was going to be getting from this much buzzed about genre film. And you know what, even though I don't think that I benefited from knowing very little about the specifics of Drive, I would not blame you for waiting to read this - or any other - review of the film before checking it out. If you want to preserve that surprise then know this: Drive is great and you need to see it. And now, let's light this candle.

So How Did You Get Here Under My Skin?

Contagion (Soderbergh, 2011)

At times while watching Steven Soderbergh's latest film, Contagion, I could not help like feeling that it had topically missed its mark. As a member of the United States I have lived through a few biological scares, but the most recent one seems to be so far in the past that I hardly consider the extremity or fear that is bred during a disease scare. I have never been directly affected, and the sensationalist media has always made me think that these bird flu and swine flu scares are simply hyped up contained cases that will be easily controlled by the world's vast medical technology. What Soderbergh is tasked with doing then is not only making me believe that these very real diseases could be...well, real, but he must also turn a vastly biological affair in to a gripping story. So after focusing on a singular individuals in his last three films (Che, The Informant!, and The Girlfriend Experience) can Soderbergh expand, as he has with other films such as Traffic and the Oceans series, once more to encompass a global scare?