Tag Archives: Drive

Drive Jump Cuts Homework 3

Drive uses jump cuts in a slightly different way than jump cuts are usually used here. Normally jump cuts make the in-your-face and urgency of a situation rise to the surface. Here the jump cuts work as normal, they are fast paced and motivate the urgency of the scene for the audience but  fail to phase Ryan Gossling (Driver). The Driver stays calm and professional to a degree which defies the jump cut. The Driver is not moved by the passage of time nor the neediness of the two robbers in his rear seat.  The camera constantly cuts to his very nervous passengers and the start contrast between the driver and the robbers is almost unsettling. After the viewer watches the scene they are rooting for the Driver, maybe for no reason other than its Ryan Gossling. Either way the audience is feeling the urgency of the chase scene and the calm demeanor of the Driver is reassuring and inspires confidence.  Then the Driver turn up the radio that we have been hearing between the police scanner,  The Clippers basketball game. This cut takes the Driver even further emotionally out of the scene, almost poking fun at the job he is doing. By the end we see that he has taken the criminals to the parking garage near the basketball game as cover for escaping, almost humorous. The jump cuts in Drive move the story along in a timely manner but function well as character development for the Driver. A difficult task but achieved to perfection here.