March 25, 2026 • 46 mins
Is there one motorsports movie out there that's worse than all the rest? Several years ago, Lily sought to find this out, and after plenty of research, one film kept coming up: 'Driven,' the 2001 box office bomb written by and starring Sylvester Stallone. But is it really that bad? And did a certain Academy Award-winning motorsports movie actually take a lot of inspiration from this cinematic disaster?
This week, Lily talks to actor, podcaster, and motorsports content creator James Coker about the magic (and pitfalls) of filmmaking and all of the different factors that made 'Driven' such a mess. Meanwhile, Yochai saves his haterade for a different film in motorsports canon.
(You can also more of James's work on Instagram and YouTube.)
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
Okay, so several years ago I became very obsessed with
trying to discover the best and worst motorsports movies ever made.
Of course you did, and eventually I stumbled upon several
message board threads proclaiming that Driven, the two thousand and
one film directed by Rennie Harlan and starring Sylvester Stallone.
Speaker 2 (00:18):
Was really bad, like how bad, like really bad. So
immediately I was intrigued.
Speaker 1 (00:25):
Summarizing the plot of Driven is a fool's errand, but
I'm going to try anyway. The basics are that Sylvester
Stallone stars as Joe Tanto, a racing driver who comes
out of retirement to mentor a promising young rookie named
Jimmy Bly in the middle of a motorsports championship.
Speaker 3 (00:39):
Sounds solid enough to me.
Speaker 2 (00:41):
Yes, you're still with me right now?
Speaker 1 (00:43):
YOHI. However, everything after this point makes absolutely no sense, so.
Speaker 2 (00:47):
Feel free to speed up the tape. Okay, here we go.
Speaker 1 (00:51):
Robert Tron Leonard of Dead Poets Society Fame plays Jimmy's
perpetually agitated brother de Mil, who emphatically shouts ninety percent
of his lines for no reason. Estella Warren, who's at
the center of a quasi love triangle between Jimmy and
his rival. Boe Brandenburg played by Til Schweiger, does what
feels like an hour's long synchronized swimming routine in the middle.
Speaker 2 (01:09):
Of the film.
Speaker 3 (01:10):
I Love Synchronized swimmer.
Speaker 1 (01:11):
Burt Reynolds is a team principal who's in a wheelchair
for reason that are never actually revealed.
Speaker 2 (01:15):
A woman named Lucretia Creesia.
Speaker 1 (01:17):
Yes, Lucretia pops in and out and I don't get
what her deal is. There are also about one hundred
car crashes that should have left everybody in this movie
dead on impact, and the amount of CGI in here
is truly maddening.
Speaker 3 (01:27):
The end wow.
Speaker 1 (01:29):
So based on all of that, it is probably not
surprising that Driven didn't do well at the box office
and continues to be a bit of a joke in
the motorsports fandom. So my questions are thus, how did
a movie that has a household name as at star,
a successful director, and a pile of money goes so wrong?
Speaker 2 (01:47):
Was it even really their fault?
Speaker 1 (01:50):
And could a recent Formula one blockbuster reveal a big
reason why Dribbon did not work? Yohan, much as I
appreciate your opinions. I do not think you are the
person to unravel all of these mysteries.
Speaker 4 (02:03):
With never miss an opportunity to put me down to
you movie.
Speaker 1 (02:07):
Okay, when it comes to unpacking this particular cinematic disaster,
I thought I needed someone who was schooled on both
Hollywood and motorsports, and I could think of no one
better than James Koker, who, among the many hats he wears,
is an actor, a podcaster, and an incredibly funny motorsports
content creator.
Speaker 2 (02:25):
So James, welcome to No Grip.
Speaker 3 (02:27):
Well, and thanks so much for having me.
Speaker 5 (02:29):
It's a real treat, big fan of Angion failure, and
to get to sit here and talk to you, it's
an honor really.
Speaker 1 (02:35):
Okay, So before we go any further, I do want
to get one thing out of the way. You don't
have to have seen Driven to listen to or enjoy
this episode. In fact, while we do talk about the plot,
I don't really think we can spoil much about this movie,
seeing as it really doesn't have much substance.
Speaker 4 (02:52):
Yeah, but I think I think after you listen, you're
gonna want to go and watch it.
Speaker 1 (02:55):
You know what, Get a glass of wine, get some
popcorn like Olivia Poe, and then just sit down and
let it wash over you. I am so unimaginably excited
for this episode. I just this movie was an experience.
So the first question I will ask you, James, is
if you had to describe your overall experience watching this
movie in three words, what would they be.
Speaker 5 (03:17):
I'll give you one word, and it was nostalgic because
I remember seeing this movie in the theaters when I
was fifteen years old, and I actually loved this movie
as a teenager. But I also I love bad movies.
It's very hard for me to hate a movie, regardless
of how critically received it is.
Speaker 3 (03:36):
Yeah, so what did you?
Speaker 2 (03:37):
Yeah? What did you like about it?
Speaker 5 (03:38):
As a teen I didn't know a lot about motorsports,
so I had nothing to compare it to. And you know,
as a like fourteen or fifteen year old kid, like
fast cars, grid.
Speaker 1 (03:49):
Girls an obsolete concept now they no longer do grid girls.
Speaker 5 (03:54):
It had everything like a kid with raging hormones wanted.
Speaker 3 (03:57):
Do you know what I mean?
Speaker 1 (03:58):
I'm laughing because right before this me, Max and Joe
had a meeting and Yohai's first comment on this movie was,
I watched it with my sons and they liked it.
Speaker 2 (04:09):
Yeah, it is a good kids movie.
Speaker 4 (04:10):
Kids have a better ability to suspend disbelief. Yeah, they're
kind of idiots in that way, like, oh, sure things
are not happening according to physics.
Speaker 3 (04:18):
It doesn't really bother them the same way. I guess.
Speaker 2 (04:21):
I will say.
Speaker 1 (04:21):
There seems to be a crash every thirty seconds in
this movie, which I could see being very fun when
you're young and maybe not as aware of what actually happens.
Speaker 5 (04:30):
I am not a person who enjoys seeing crashes in
any motorsport race, and I didn't remember how over the
top the crashes were watching it back as a forty
one year old man. I just kept thinking to myself
how over the top they were. I'm like, you really
didn't need that, Just like a normal crash that you
(04:51):
would see in an IndyCar and F one race is sufficient.
Speaker 1 (04:54):
And every crash was like, it's not just someone going
into a wall, it's like a wall. They tumbled twelve
times and then hit twelve more cars. Somehow all of
the cars are still able to run after that, you know,
for a movie that had so many crashes, like also,
nothing really happens. I think that's like the funniest part
of this whole thing.
Speaker 4 (05:12):
I don't want to like give spoilers here or anything
like that, but I was almost surprised that there there
wasn't like some kind of an alligator, you know, something
like that evolved right true.
Speaker 1 (05:21):
Before we dive into the pre production, production, filming, and
everything else that happened in this movie, I will give
the quick log line that is on IMDb for this
as well as another movie's log line, and like I said,
we will see how these two things come together. So
log line for Driven is, and this is a direct quote,
a young hotshot driver is in the middle of a
championship season and is coming apart at the seams. A
(05:43):
former cart champion is called in to give him guidance.
Speaker 6 (05:47):
You know what.
Speaker 1 (05:47):
That log line I think represents what they were going for. Yeah,
whether or not that was successful, we will get into.
And then I will just say there's another movie's log
line I want to read that is very similar. The
log line reads a form one driver comes out of
retirement to mentor and team up with a younger driver,
and that is the f one movie right Anyway, before
(06:07):
we even get into the movie itself a little bit
about the guy who's responsible for this whole production, and
that is Sylvester Stallone.
Speaker 5 (06:14):
A lot of people don't realize that he has written
so many of the films that he's been in, and
he is actually prolific. And I think the reason he
wrote Rocky was because he wasn't getting any parts in Hollywood.
And so, regardless of what you think of Sylvester Stillone
as an actor, he has been able to essentially make
(06:35):
a career for himself for decades.
Speaker 3 (06:37):
And be an icon. And a lot of that is
not luck.
Speaker 5 (06:40):
It's like him creating his own opportunities. So I always
want to give him a lot of credit for that,
for sure.
Speaker 2 (06:46):
And there is a story I read.
Speaker 1 (06:47):
It's probably a little it's been dressed up in like
folklore basically, but some sort of story of you know,
a teacher being like you should you know, your son
can only aim to be like a garbage man or something,
and so he's like, I'm I want to become an
actor and a screenwriter, and that's what I'm going to do.
And then here we are several decades later. That seems
to be seems to be his vibe, but yet so basically,
to fill in a couple of the gaps here, there
are actually two different potential legal names for him. It's
(07:07):
either Sylvester Gardenzio Stallone or Michael Sylvester Gardenzio Stallone, which
I already I think sets the scene of like chaos
for this man. Born July sixth, nineteen forty six in
New York, grew up in Maryland, Washington, d c. And
then Philly. He had a very chaotic family life. His mom, Jackie,
was a celebrity astrologer and women's professional wrestling promoter.
Speaker 2 (07:29):
Oh wow yeah.
Speaker 1 (07:30):
And then his dad, Frank Senior, ran a bunch of
successful hair salons and was also an avid polo player.
Sylvester Stallone did grow up in some foster care and
like boarding care as a young kid, But I think
the thing that best describes who he was as a
young person was in high school he was voted most
likely to end up in the electric chair. Oh my god,
(07:50):
hell of a superlative.
Speaker 5 (07:51):
I was elected most likely to join the circus.
Speaker 2 (07:55):
Okay, that's fun. I got no superlatives.
Speaker 1 (07:57):
I was not, I guess, interesting enough to have that
bestow upon me as a youth, which I guess is fine.
Speaker 5 (08:01):
You know you were too busy being locked in.
Speaker 2 (08:04):
That's true. I was a girl boss.
Speaker 1 (08:05):
I did go through a girl boss era anyway, different
time for Sylvester Stallone who most likely to end up
in the electric chair. The other thing too, that I
think is important about like Sylvester Stallone having kind of
a very specific look and very.
Speaker 2 (08:16):
One of a kind look.
Speaker 1 (08:18):
Part of the reason for that is actually that when
his mother was in labor with him, the doctors used
two pairs of forceps and accidentally severed a nerve, which
led to paralysis in the lower left side of his
face that gives him that perpetually snarling look that he has,
and also slurred his speech a little bit. So yeah,
so a lot of the reason actually he originally got
into bodybuilding and acting was because of bullying he experienced.
Speaker 2 (08:40):
When he was younger. I had no idea.
Speaker 1 (08:42):
Yeah, so really fascinating. He knew from a young age
he wanted to be an actor and a screenwriter. He
eventually moves to New York in the late sixties. He's
struggling for much of the early seventies for the reasons
everyone does, but also because he does have a very
specific look and persona, and then eventually he finds gigantic
success in his breakthrough nineteen seventies six movie Rocky, which
he wrote and starred in, Came Away with Oscar wins.
Speaker 2 (09:05):
No, theca has become a modern classic.
Speaker 4 (09:10):
Maybe you have to get home, We'll get some sleep
and obviously.
Speaker 1 (09:13):
He then proceeds to have a slew of successes in
the nineteen eighties or early nineties as an action star.
Films included Cobra Tango and Cash Demolition Man, The Specialist.
Speaker 2 (09:23):
John Rambo, Rambo.
Speaker 3 (09:24):
A drifter just passing through their town.
Speaker 1 (09:27):
All this to say, by like the mid nineties, Sylvester
Stallone was not quite sure where to go with his career.
A lot of movies are becoming hit or miss. Audience
attitudes and preferences were changing. What it meant to be
an action star was starting to shift. Obviously, other stars
are coming into play. Keanu Reeves, who we know is
an unofficial ambassador to F one and an unofficial mascot
of the Cadillac F one team, really came on the
(09:49):
scene at this point. He's almost twenty years younger than
Sylvester Stallone. Sylvester Stallone was in talks to be in
the movie Speed, which Keanu Reeves obviously ended up starring
in became a huge movie for him. So there's a
real sorry to be like a little bit of a
changing of the guard in the nineties, right, And so
at this point, subsist Alone kind of is in need
of a little bit of.
Speaker 2 (10:07):
A thrust, so to speak.
Speaker 1 (10:08):
As far as where we start our actual journey with Driven,
the movie, cebestost Alone reportedly gets the idea for this
while he's filming a nineteen ninety five sci fi film
called Judge Dread.
Speaker 5 (10:21):
I love that movie as a kid.
Speaker 2 (10:23):
Great, I am the Law, I will say. Other people
claim it's one of his worst movies ever.
Speaker 7 (10:27):
No, Roger, I never have looked at the camera and
talked to an actor. I'm going to break this tradition
right now. I know stallone, you probably hate my God,
so you think I hate you.
Speaker 2 (10:35):
I don't hate you.
Speaker 3 (10:36):
I like your talent.
Speaker 7 (10:37):
I want you to use it. This isn't what you
were put on earth for. You can do this in
your sleep, and sometimes it looks like that's exactly what
you're doing.
Speaker 5 (10:44):
I haven't watched it as an adult, so I don't
know if it holds up in my memory.
Speaker 3 (10:48):
Yes, I have to check it out.
Speaker 1 (10:49):
The important thing with Judge Dread though, is that because
he's filming in Europe, he begins to attend F one
races across the continent, including the nineteen ninety seven Italian
Grand Prix, where he actually it's talking about wanting to
make his own motorsports movie and it's really in the works. However,
I'm sure you noticed that Driven is not taking place
in F one, correct, And it seems like this very
(11:10):
bastardized version of F one meets some sort of like
US based motorsports series. But basically the movie will end
up taking place in the now defunct Championship Auto.
Speaker 2 (11:21):
Racing Teams series. Yes, it would take.
Speaker 1 (11:24):
Us like twelve episodes to go through the history of
that series. It's very complicated. But the big thing to
know is that there's this huge split in the nineties.
There's like two different racing series that are based in
the US. Eventually Kart will cease to exist and IndyCar
is obviously what we are talking about nowadays.
Speaker 5 (11:38):
I will say in the eighties and nineties, Kart was
giving Formula one a run for its money. It was
a Worldwide Series. It was very successful. There at one
point where talks for Kart to purchase Formula One because
Formula one was not doing well. And yeah, eventually there
was the split, which helped aid NASCAR's rise to prominence
(11:58):
of popularity in the United States. And then eventually KRT
Chapionship Auto Racing Teams and IRL Indie Racing League merged
to form what we now know as IndyCar. But I
will say at that time Kart was doing pretty well.
Like a lot of people now compare IndyCar as Walmart
F one, and in some ways that is an accurate description,
(12:20):
even though I love IndyCar despite the whole freedom to
fifty things. Big news out of the nation's capital for
the first time ever, IndyCars will roar through the streets
of Washington. We'll talk about this some other time, but
at the time cart was very popular and very successful.
Speaker 1 (12:36):
I also find Kart interesting because it was like largely
in the US. But then they'd be like, we're going
to Australia, We're going to Brazil, and you'd be like, oh, okay.
Speaker 5 (12:45):
They would do a handful of international races. They would
race in Brazil, Japan, Australia, but it's still at its
core was an American series or a North American series.
Speaker 2 (12:55):
Yeah for sure.
Speaker 1 (12:56):
And so James, why do you think that Sylvester Stallone
ended up to work with Kart and do a movie
around Kart instead of getting to do this big F
one movie that he originally dreamed of.
Speaker 5 (13:08):
Well, I think it was Bernie Ecklestone. Bernie Eckleston is
very hard to work with, ed Bernie.
Speaker 1 (13:16):
Yeah, so Bernie, we're talking about Bernie Ecclestone as a refresher.
He is a British businessman who's very old but still alive,
who really came into power as an F one executive
back in the nineteen seventies and he eventually owned the
rights to the F one brand. So his big innovation
that everyone gives him a lot of credit for is
that he made broadcasters around the world pay a lot
of money for the TV rights to the sport. But
(13:38):
related to that, he also controlled if F one could
be filmed or portrayed in other media, like in movies.
Speaker 5 (13:44):
Bernie Ecklestone, I believe, if I'm remembering correctly, had a
very anti American sentiment. Yes, he did not think American
audiences were refined enough for Formula one.
Speaker 2 (13:54):
He thought we were tacky.
Speaker 1 (13:55):
I mean, anyone who wasn't like a rich white man
from Monaco. He essentially didn't think was like worth his
time or was going to be a good consumer of
the F one product, right, which is also insane because
there's only so many rich white men from Monaco who
like exist in the world and would spend that money.
Speaker 2 (14:09):
Yeah, but anyway, let's get back to Driven.
Speaker 1 (14:12):
So sovests alone is writing this movie that he wants
to be based on Formula one, but he is shut
down by Formula one.
Speaker 5 (14:18):
And I believe I read somewhere that he went through
like twenty five versions of the script and then eventually
Formula one I think passed on it.
Speaker 1 (14:26):
Yeah, Bernie, He's like, no, can't do. You're not getting
any access to anything. You cannot be an Arpaddock.
Speaker 5 (14:31):
So he had to change it to Kart to be
able to get the access to give it the authenticity
that he wanted.
Speaker 1 (14:38):
Again, I will posit here very different than the F
one movie. Twenty five years later. When they want access,
they get it to a point that is almost like
a little bit absurd. Looking back at the F one movie,
but completely polar opposite response. So basically we end up
with a movie that is taking place not F one,
but a lot of the events and incidents and whatnot
are inspired by things that are happening in F one
(15:00):
one at the time.
Speaker 2 (15:00):
And the other thing I'll just.
Speaker 1 (15:01):
Mention too late nineties, early two thousands and F one
was kind of wild looking back, but it's an interesting
era where people are very nostalgic for it. Obviously, you
have the likes of Michael Schumacher.
Speaker 4 (15:11):
Oh Schumacher, the Germany's out of the Australian.
Speaker 1 (15:18):
I'm thinking about these races that Sylvester Stoloneo had been
going to in Europe. You're dealing with the likes of
Damon Hill, Jacque milnev Mika hackinan of course.
Speaker 5 (15:25):
Eddie Irvine who popped up in the Epstein Files.
Speaker 8 (15:28):
When you're famous, say I don't know if you know,
but life becomes a lot easier. You could actually be
you know, you could be quite physically disabled and still
still do well if you're famous.
Speaker 2 (15:41):
Well, you said it, not me.
Speaker 1 (15:42):
I can see why, based on who those guys were,
how they were acting, why Sylvester Stallone would be really
into this, but then yeah, only to be put back
in square one by the fact that F one wants
something to do with him or his movie or whatever
he is working on. So moving forward, Yeah, he ends
up writing twenty five drafts of the script, which I
will say, as a professional writer, twenty five drafts is
(16:03):
too many drafts.
Speaker 2 (16:04):
It's like a bell curve.
Speaker 1 (16:04):
It's gonna get better and then get much much worse
the longer you poken prod it something one. So, James,
this is the part of the episode where I would
usually play a clip for you and for listeners to
hear some of the terrible dialogue in this movie that
came from these twenty five drafts. Unfortunately, we can't do
that because we don't want to be sued. So instead
we have something even better, which is that I have
(16:27):
asked Yohi and our executive producer Max to step into
the studio and take driven script for a spin. So
for context, Max will be playing the role of still
Loan's Joe Tanto and Yohi is the rough and tough
driver Bo Brandenburg played in the movie by Till Schweiger.
Speaker 2 (16:43):
Guys action hy Bo.
Speaker 9 (16:48):
If this is about pride, you better forget it, because
that's how this whole thing started.
Speaker 3 (16:53):
Well, yeah, what would you do me to get.
Speaker 9 (16:56):
Back someone I really loved to get that rock out
of my stumach I'd crawl. You'd crawl, crawl, Joe, you
never crawl. I'd crawl until there's nothing left. Come on,
champ use your head.
Speaker 1 (17:14):
And that is the written masterpiece that comes out of
twenty five draws.
Speaker 2 (17:17):
At this script.
Speaker 5 (17:18):
It reminds me a lot of the F One movie,
where a lot of the dialogue felt pretty unnatural and
forced and cliche. At times, when every two pages a
character has a monologue that feels like an audition to
get into, like an acting conservatory, but it's poorly written,
I feel like you're in for a bumpy ride, both
(17:39):
as like a filmmaker and also as an audience member.
For sure, I don't think Sylvester Saloon, even though he
has been a prolific screenwriter and producer, has been known
for being an excellent writer. Like I think he comes
up with excellent concepts and in the right environment, he
works with collaborators and directors and editors who are able
to take a script into into something great. Yeah, which
(18:01):
I feel like Renny Harland fails to do Yeah.
Speaker 1 (18:03):
When you say Renny Harland, he's the guy who eventually
came on to direct Driven.
Speaker 5 (18:06):
Rendy Harland in this movie often just directed the actors
to yell at each other, for sure. There's a scene
after Memo, who is like the reserve driver for the team,
crashes and Joe Tanto goes back to the garage where
the accident happened to look at Memo's wrecked car, and
then out of nowhere, Burt Reynolds just rolls out of
(18:30):
a dark corner because his character is in a wheelchair,
just rolls out of a dark corner right into a
perfectly placed spotlight, and they start to have a conversation
where they're just yelling back and forth at each other,
and Burt Reynolds was working hard, but his facelift was
working harder. And then there was another scene where Jimmy Bly,
(18:55):
who's this rookie driver, his brother is his like publicist, manager, agent, whatever.
So he finds out that his brother's gone behind his
back and started working with his rival and is conspiring
to replace his own brother on the team. Jimmy says,
why couldn't have you waited just a little longer and
Demil says, because I'm not your waiter, Chef's kiss. There's
(19:19):
just there's a lot of yelling in this movie, and
there's a lot of actors what we would call pushing
in this movie. They're pushing the emotion through instead of
like letting the emotion happen. It's interesting because you see
Robert Sean Lennard doing this, who plays Demil, Jimmy Blis's brother.
And Robert Shawan Lenard is a great actor. I loved
him in Dead Poet's Society House obviously, yes, the house
he was in House forever. He's an unbelievable actor. He's
(19:41):
had a long and storied career. But in this movie,
in almost every scene he does with Kip Prdu, he
is pushing so hard.
Speaker 1 (19:48):
You know what it reminded me of is I had
to take some some like intro acting classes in high
school for like an arts credit.
Speaker 2 (19:54):
I'm a terrible actress. It should be noted.
Speaker 1 (19:56):
My mother after seeing me in like at an acting showcase,
she was like, you were adequate, and I was like,
thank you, mom, that actually is very kind of you. Yeah,
but I just remember that scene that there was a
kid who we were doing a scene from The Odd Couple,
and every scene he would kind of take a dramatic
pause before his lines and then just say that. But
the whole point that the scene we were doing is
we're supposed to be playing poker, right, so it's suposed
to be this very casual and formal environment, and this
(20:17):
guy is he's acting in a completely different production. He
might as well be in Shakespeare, and the rest of
us are just trying to play a poker game. And
that's what a lot of this movie reminded me of.
And there's just a lot of drama held in that
isn't really earned, yes, compared to what the script is
and the action is going on around them. Yeah.
Speaker 5 (20:33):
Another good example of that is Jimmy Blize had one
bad race after winning five, and that's a whole nother
plot hole, because if you had already won five races
out of seven, people would be over the moon about you.
But Robert Shaan Leonard does this monologue where he's like,
you were just this eight year old, goofy looking kid
coming from three blaps behind to be kids twice his age.
(20:54):
He really took a dramatic pause and turned a gear
that wasn't natural at all. He's like, all right, time
to be super dramatic, time to be super thoughtful. This
is me stepping out into the spotlight. And first of all,
that whole speech doesn't make sense because KRT races are
like twenty minutes long, so if you're three laps behind,
there's no way you're getting back. Second, mister screenwriter, beating
(21:15):
kids twice your age is not the flex you think
it is, because unless those go karts are weight corrected,
an eight year old is a serious weight advantage to
someone twice their age in a go kart race.
Speaker 2 (21:26):
Okay, mister physics, Like you know what it is though.
Speaker 1 (21:33):
I So we talked about the twenty five drafts, so
let's just alone. Has started off being like, I'm gonna
write this gritty man's journey through his trials and tribulations,
and he's like having this fall from his career heights.
He's this drunk with problems and his wife is a
mess for a variety of.
Speaker 2 (21:50):
Reasons which we'll get into.
Speaker 1 (21:51):
He ends up with this like ensemble movie where this
character is kind of in that world but not really
like it all just gets so jumbled to where I
think no one quite knows which draft of this movie
almost that they are having to act in.
Speaker 2 (22:03):
He knows what he's making because.
Speaker 1 (22:05):
He's kind of writing about himself, but no one else
was really like in on it.
Speaker 5 (22:08):
I think also what happened with this film is like
the original cut was like four or five hours long, yeah,
or something like that for hours ago, and I think
there are a lot of things that we see in
the final cut of the film that are supposed to
be references to things that we do not see.
Speaker 1 (22:25):
All right, before we pause for some ads, I do
want to remind you that we are a growing show
and we need your help. Rate and review no grip
on Apple, Spotify or wherever you listen to podcasts, and
don't forget to click that follower subscribe button while you're
at it. Okay, see you after the break ad, breakover,
(22:48):
we're back. So to move on to you've brought him up.
The director of this film is Renny Harlan and so
Soubusterist alone. He has the script, he has a million
drafts of it. It took him four years to get
financing for this movie, and of course he's thinking about director.
So him and Sebestos Stolone had worked together on the
nineteen ninety three action thriller Cliffhanger.
Speaker 2 (23:07):
Which did very well, so good.
Speaker 1 (23:08):
It was the seventh highest grossing film in nineteen ninety three,
so other people also liked it, so obviously they had
a good time working together. It seemed to have gone
well enough.
Speaker 5 (23:17):
And I think I think they were good friends in
real life until after this movie, which we'll talk about later.
Speaker 1 (23:22):
Yes, and Rennie Harlan, he is finished. He is to
this day the most internationally successful finish filmmaker in terms
of revenue.
Speaker 2 (23:30):
But I would say he's the type of guy who.
Speaker 1 (23:32):
Films a lot of movies like a Nightmare on Elm
Street four, Die Hard Too, a lot of sequels to
like successful like action y thriller refranchises from what I
could tell, and then then then like the occasional rom
com like I was like, what is okay?
Speaker 2 (23:46):
Sure?
Speaker 5 (23:46):
Well, the three films that stuck out on his IMDb
to me were die Hard Too, Cliffhanger, and Deep Blue Sea.
Like Deep Blu s is a terrible movie, but I
remember loving it as a kid. I remember ellll cool
Jay's wrap from that movie. Deep as Blue is My
hat is like a sharks fan, and I feel like
a lot of the movies in his filmography are B
(24:07):
movies or like very large budget B movies. They're like
sort of going into the territory of B movies. But
he's always worked. Oh yeah, And he was also briefly
married to Gena Davis for five years, and I saw
on his Wikipedia that they got divorced because he ended
up having a son with Geena Davis's personal assistant. Incredible
content allegedly I don't know, didn't say allegedly in the
(24:32):
Wikipedia sensational he's had quite a colorful life.
Speaker 2 (24:35):
Indeed. The other thing to note, I think of one.
Speaker 1 (24:37):
So he on top of being a guy doing all
of his movie stuff, he's an enormous motorsports fan. And
he was actually working on trying to do a movie
about Ayrton Senna, who tragically killed in a crash in
nineteen ninety four.
Speaker 2 (24:50):
So he was a huge motorsports fan.
Speaker 1 (24:51):
He obviously was keeping up with what was happening on
the track, and famously Rennie harlan Is finished Mika hackinan
won two back to back World Driver's titles in late nineties.
Speaker 4 (25:00):
Oh yeah, it was so easy, you can't believe it.
Speaker 3 (25:04):
No life wasn't.
Speaker 1 (25:05):
So there's no doubt that Rennie Harlan is like aware
that his fellow countryman is killing it in F one
at this exact time when Sylvester Stallone is shopping around
in motorsports movie that he wanted to be an F
one movie. So Rennie Harlan, similar to Sylvester Stallone, is
kind of having like a slightly rough go of it
by the mid nineties. My favorite example of this being
that in nineteen ninety five, Rennie Harlan directed the movie
(25:27):
Cutthroat Island. It is considered one of the biggest box
office bombs of all time. It earned just sixteen million
dollars against a budget somewhere between ninety two to one
hundred and fifteen million dollars.
Speaker 10 (25:38):
I've seen it before. The ships didn't look glamorous. Matthew
Modin and she do not engage each other. I really
wonder about what's going on with Matthew Modine's career because
this was a superior actor, and I think he's just
wasted in a fluff like this.
Speaker 1 (25:51):
Well, all this to say he needed a win, so
he's like, Okay, I want I want to do this
motorsports movie. I love motorsports. I've worked with Sylvester Stallone.
We obviously were very commercially successful. Let's do it. And
then the last thing I'll just note yet we brought
up the casting before and some of the people in it.
Legendary actor Burt Reynolds, he actually owned a NASCAR team
in the eighties, so he is just a motorsports fan
(26:11):
as well. Kip Pardue, I feel like this movie is
like a weird who's who of like the late nineties,
early two thousands, in such a specific way.
Speaker 5 (26:19):
There's a lot of like where are they now? Questions
watching this movie.
Speaker 1 (26:22):
Oh yeah, I also mention Estella Warrant one of the
weirdest sequences in this movie is when her character in
this movie starts doing like a synchronized swimming routine with
Jimmy Blyth.
Speaker 5 (26:34):
When I saw that scene, I immediately thought, I bet
she went to the director and was like, hey, I
really would love that an opportunity to show off my
synchronized swimming skills. I looked up and saw that she
was a champion synchronized swimmer with a Canadian national team.
Speaker 1 (26:48):
Yeah, it was such an extended sequence too, but her
toes were so expertly pointed that I was like, Okay,
this has to be from decades of training, because that
is just not like a natural pose.
Speaker 5 (26:59):
And also the was supposed to be at like a
hotel pool in Japan, but it clearly was like a
hotel pool in Toronto.
Speaker 3 (27:05):
And then they put up.
Speaker 5 (27:06):
A giant Japanese flag because I guess that's what they
do at all hotel pools in Japan, to make it
very clear that we're in Japan. Okay, this is not
La this is not Toronto. Yeah, we're in downtown Tokyo.
Speaker 1 (27:17):
Much of this movie was you didn't want to look
a little too hard at the background because everything would
start falling apart the second you gave it an extra look. Yes,
the editing felt very late nineties early two thousands to me,
but also was simultaneously trying to cover up a bunch
of continuity and other errors to a level and degree
that made no sense.
Speaker 5 (27:35):
I also feel like Rennie Harlan was in love with
the phosphade, where you know, like layering one shot on
top of another, on top of another, top of another.
Another life he would crush it. Directing commercials for Perfume
and cologne because there were like a lot of shots
layered on top of one another, like he couldn't decide
which shot he wanted to use, so he's like, I'm
(27:55):
just going to use all of them at the same time.
Speaker 1 (27:57):
And that's hawnened up with a four hour movie that
then cut into a movie. It's two hours long and
probably just needed to be like forty minutes to be
completely honest, before we just head into like filming in
post production, just the quick recap of where we are
at this point. We have Sebestos alone who decides to
write a motorsports movie about a motorsports series that he's
not allowed to talk about or film around. He wrote
about it across two dozen drafts. He's working with a
(28:20):
director who's going through a really hit or miss period.
They together are about to shoot a highly technical film.
No one quite knows exactly what they are supposed to
be acting in, or the tone or literally anything that's happening,
because also a lot of it's going to be CGI okay,
So that's where we're at going.
Speaker 2 (28:34):
Into totally the actual production.
Speaker 1 (28:36):
The main cast started filming July two thousand, but a
lot of the filming took place before that around various
KRT races. We do see cameos of different actual racing
drivers of the time. All told, the movie shot over
eight months and nine races in five countries, and the
studio at the time and some of their press releases
boasted that driven utilized state of the art technology to
(28:57):
simulate the driver's point of view while traveling. It speeds
in excess of two hundred and forty miles per hour,
which I will point out also sounds a lot like
some of the F one movie marketing a quarter century later.
Speaker 3 (29:10):
For sure.
Speaker 1 (29:11):
The other thing, as we've mentioned, because this wasn't F one,
it was Kart, but also they weren't really calling it
kart per se. We got this kind of bizarre like
semi generic open wheel racing motorsports world. It's just kind
of like it is motor sports, like that's but that's
that's it.
Speaker 5 (29:27):
There were times where you could barely see the KRT
branding in the background, but they never called it kart outright,
which was confusing.
Speaker 1 (29:34):
Yeah, you're just like, truly, this makes no sense. And
the other big thing that I think speaks to all
the a bunch of other issues they had on top
of the script on top of you know, Rennie Harlan's
direction is that there are over three thousand camera setups
in this movie. For instance, in the rainy Germany race.
It's one of a billion different potential climaxes in this movie.
But anyway, they had the issue of having to keep
(29:56):
the crew safe. But then also they'd worry about keeping
the electron extry because they were dealing with what was
called a relentless deluge of water from rain spinners to
make all of that happen, also further jacking up the
cost of this movie. Production had its own fleet of
sixteen race cars, including a two seater race car that
Rennie Harlan employed to create the illusion of the actors
(30:17):
driving the cars at one hundred and fifty miles an hour.
Just a very cumbersome production.
Speaker 5 (30:21):
Apparently on the DVD you can watch like a longer
cut that has like an additional fifty one minutes in it. Yes,
but you can't see the original four hour cut anywhere else.
Speaker 1 (30:32):
Yes, there's a missing hour ten that we'll never know about.
Speaker 3 (30:35):
I would love to see it, you would.
Speaker 1 (30:36):
I'm like, I don't know if I need that personally,
just in my life We're going to take a break
for some ads. I promise this won't be as long
as Driven's four hour director's cut. We're back and we're
talking about the worst motorsports movie of all time. Okay,
so the movie comes out in two thousand and one.
(30:59):
I will note that the official tagline for Warner Brothers
is welcome to the human race.
Speaker 3 (31:04):
I love it.
Speaker 1 (31:07):
On a more dour note. Another thing I just wanted
to mention. In February of two thousand and ones, this
is two months before the movie's release, an exotic dancer
filed a lawsuit accusing Sylvester Stallone of rape in two thousand,
so this was kind of at least in the news
around the time where they're trying to start ramping up promotion,
and you know, movie posters would be out things like that,
So that all of that is kind of unfolding as
promos and going underway that this movie eventually does premiere,
(31:31):
and once again, in a move that sounds like something
very close to the F one Movies promotion, this premiere
includes real life cart drivers racing around and demonstrating pit
stops in modified champ cars down Hollywood Boulevard.
Speaker 2 (31:44):
Cool, Yeah, you went to the F one premiere I did.
Speaker 3 (31:47):
In New York. It was great.
Speaker 5 (31:48):
They had a red carpet set up in Times Square, well,
it was a black carpet, and then each team had
a livery represented on that carpet, but they didn't do
pit stops.
Speaker 1 (31:59):
Before we dive into to what everyone else said about
this movie, we've been talking about your thoughts on it
throughout in certain scenes and whatnot. But yeah, overarchingly, how
did you feel about Driven now that you have seen
it both as an adolescent an adult.
Speaker 5 (32:13):
Watching it as adult, I feel like the movie lacked
realistic motivation throughout the film. So you start off with
the first scene where you see Bob Brandenburg fighting with
his girlfriend Sophia played by Stella Wardon. He's having a
bad season and he's blaming his girlfriend on an distraction.
(32:34):
But when you watch the montage at the getting the movie,
he's still getting on podiums. There were times where like
I was unable to believe the reality of the movie. Demil,
who is Jimmy Bli's manager and publicist, was on the
radio talking to him in the car, and I'm like,
they would never let that happen in a race.
Speaker 1 (32:49):
Oh, everybody talked to everyone on the headset like on Mike.
I was like, why is everyone allowed to be talking
to drivers like mid rate?
Speaker 5 (32:59):
Jason at Zukus wrote, why does everybody have headphone privileges
in this movie?
Speaker 2 (33:05):
It's true? What okay about ball? Else?
Speaker 1 (33:08):
May I just say a brief aside consider the fact
that this logline is like this curmudgeon comes back to
mentor a young cocky driver or whatever. There is almost
no mentorship going on. I feel like Jimmy Bly and
Joe Tanto have like six lines total together throughout this
whole movie.
Speaker 5 (33:22):
I wouldn't be surprised if some of the stuff that
ended up on the cutting room floor was what you
are saying is missing from this film.
Speaker 1 (33:30):
That is exactly what I thought as well, because I
was like, man, I am missing the part where this
guy is met yea, I'm missing the montage like them
becoming buddies over several races and them bonding at a
bar or something that they do.
Speaker 5 (33:42):
Give me the Rocky Balboa Apollo Creed training montage where
they're like running on the beach and then jumping into waves,
hugging each other while jumping up and down. That's what
I want between Joe Tanto and Jimmy Blide.
Speaker 2 (33:52):
Also again with the we had Joe and Bow, We've
got Joe and Jimmy.
Speaker 3 (33:56):
Like.
Speaker 1 (33:58):
You know what Milldamil like Damil at this point, I'm like,
dam Demila and Lucretia are fine apparently, and then they're
just Kathy and You're like okay, yeah, Like but the
overarchingly in an effort to like do too much the
actual just like basic like this curmudgeon come to this
young guy. They bond and then there's like a lesson,
like we missed that sort of core thing that just
(34:20):
had to happen.
Speaker 2 (34:21):
It just wasn't there. At the end of the day.
He's also not that much of a curmudgeon.
Speaker 5 (34:25):
Joe Tanto is a very like personal friendly person. Yeah,
in this entire movie.
Speaker 1 (34:29):
If anything, the Burt Reynolds character, he's a little more mysterious.
I kind of had to piece together what the backstory
was there, because they just are like, yeah, here's Burt Reynolds,
the team principal, and something happened to him.
Speaker 5 (34:39):
I imagine that the detail of Carl Henry being in
the wheelchair was from the original F one script and
probably was a tribute to or a reference to Frank Williams.
Speaker 2 (34:49):
Yep, I could see that. That's my assumption.
Speaker 5 (34:51):
I also think the scene where Jimmy and Joe Tanto
save Memo might be a reference to Ayrton Senna saving
Eric Kumas and free practice during the nineteen ninety two
Belgian Grand Prix ooh Agel. Senna was the first to
reach the scene of the crash and he rushed to
help the motionless Frenchman where he stopped his car, got
out and saved Eric Comas's life. But you're right, we
(35:15):
never get a reference or understand why he's in that chair.
Speaker 2 (35:19):
And I mean, it's for Renolds. He's trying, he's trying
it to your point, he's trying real hard, but it's
just it's just like it's just not coming together.
Speaker 1 (35:27):
And I will say critics at the time said basically
everything that we're saying. So I actually put together a
few snippets from reviews back in two thousand and one.
The first one is from Rita Kempley at The Washington Post,
and she wrote, there are two lessons here. One skip
the movie and two find out who Reynold's plastic surgeon is.
And don't make an appointment. And then Kembley's colleague Michael
(35:48):
O'Sullivan also wrote that it's like a music video shot
by a cops camera crew on crystal meth. And then
we had Owen Glieberman from Entertainment Weekly describing the movie
as mostly preposterous, and he also added that it has
no dramatic center.
Speaker 5 (36:03):
Sounds familiar to many of the reviews from a more
recent murder sport film.
Speaker 2 (36:08):
A much more recent one.
Speaker 1 (36:12):
And then one of my favorites came from USA Today's
Mike Clark, who wrote that Driven was a race car
drama full of flashy but empty images and a soundtrack
that makes you feel as if you're being shaken on
a motel rumble bed.
Speaker 5 (36:25):
Well, that probably is in reference to the music, which
was by BT, who is an American artist in the
electronic music genre who is often credited as a pioneer
of trance and intelligent dance music that paved the way
for EDM. And when I read that sentence, I was like,
I don't know if he wrote that himself or not.
Some of the songs in the movie are like dark,
ominous tones. Some feel like they're like knockoffs. Of the
(36:48):
Blood Raves song from Blade. Some of the songs sound
like they're off the soundtrack of like a a Japanese RPG.
When you're just exploring the open world. The music is
all over the place.
Speaker 2 (36:58):
I will say, to its credit, it is very late nineties.
Speaker 5 (37:00):
There's one song from the soundtrack though, that remains to
be one of my favorite songs ever, and that is
Mother Bye Era. It's like an electronic dance song that
has like Gregorian Chance with it or something like that.
And that song plays right before the very last race
of the film, which is at bell Isle outside of Detroit,
(37:21):
and that song remains to be like one of my
most favorite songs in the history of my life. I
love that song. I will stop what I'm doing and
listen to it.
Speaker 1 (37:29):
I'm glad you least got some enjoyment not otherwise found
in this film.
Speaker 5 (37:34):
Out of that, I will also say, watching this movie
and looking at all the branding on the cars, and
this might be a very controversial take, but I'm just
gonna say it, bring cigarettes back to racing. Let's get
rid of sports betting, let's get rid of AI, and
just bring back cigarettes. At least cigarettes are cool. I
(37:54):
don't smoke, but I love cigarette branding. There's something very
cool and sexy about it.
Speaker 1 (38:00):
Well, because their branding has to work or else the
whole product, whereas like AI, they don't.
Speaker 5 (38:04):
Yeah, but you'll always look cool smoking a cigarette, you'll
never look cool. Like asking chat GPT, how long you
have to boil fetichini for?
Speaker 2 (38:13):
How long do you have to boil fetacini for? I
don't know, let's ask what a fun idea?
Speaker 3 (38:20):
Sounds like you're cooking up a feast.
Speaker 1 (38:22):
To cook fetticini, start by boiling well salted water next. Okay,
So to wrap up, like the PostScript of this of
this movie, in terms of accolades, to no one's surprise,
no oscars, nothing of a claim. I did get seven
nominations for the twenty second Golden Raspberry Awards the Razzies.
Estella Warren one worse Supporting actress, but it was for
(38:42):
both Driven and then the movie Planet of the.
Speaker 2 (38:44):
Apes, so she had a year rough rough.
Speaker 1 (38:47):
To be Estella Warren and then on the motorsports side
of things, Kart dissolved just two years later, in two
thousand and three, after more than a decade of particularly
messy legal disputes and financial woes, and today we enjoy
the Car series instead.
Speaker 4 (39:02):
How did you call it the Walmart F one people?
Speaker 3 (39:06):
I don't call it that.
Speaker 5 (39:07):
People call it Walt F one, which sometimes feels accurate
because it does operate on a much smaller budget, and
you would say a lot of the brands and partners
that operate within that space aren't as premium or luxury
as the ones you would see in Formula One. But
I still like IndyCar very much.
Speaker 1 (39:26):
Whenever I talk to non Americans about IndyCar, the fact
that there are commercial breaks during an IndyCar race is
something that like they are up all frustrating, Yeah, which
also just feels a little F one.
Speaker 2 (39:36):
Walmart like F one would never do.
Speaker 3 (39:37):
That to us, or if they didn't, will stop the race.
Speaker 1 (39:40):
No, the race is going on, and they'll sometimes either
just go to a commercial or they'll put the race
in like a tiny box in the corner and the
commercial plays out, kind of like in football when they
do this in the NFL.
Speaker 4 (39:49):
But what if something happens, will they like cut to
the commercials?
Speaker 5 (39:52):
Nope, But Americans cut to commercial for everything. We cut
to commercial during the insurrection on January sixth, like there
are people storming the cap On, attacking police officers, and
then we get a double box on CNN and be
like Whopper, Whopper, Whopper, Whopper, Whopper Whopper.
Speaker 1 (40:08):
On this note, though, the thing I'll mention is that
obviously it does not appear that this movie, given what
we know about Kart dissolving two years later, didn't do
anything for Kart as a brand. And yes, part of
that is the fact that, like the motorsports series in
this movie is very generic and we never quite know
what it actually is supposed to be. But I also
again bring it back to the f A movie. I
will say the big question that remains right now is like, Okay,
(40:31):
Apple Studios and F one spent somewhere between two hundred
fifty to three hundred million dollars making and marketing this movie,
and will that actually move the.
Speaker 2 (40:37):
Needle at all for F one? Right Like?
Speaker 1 (40:40):
Did it actually bring in new fans? It's remained to
be seen what they got out of it as far
as a fan base.
Speaker 5 (40:47):
I think they were hoping it would replicate the success
that Drive or Survive brought the series. I think it
maybe caused new fans to maybe watch a race or two,
But I don't think it converted that many people into
being full time.
Speaker 2 (40:59):
For me the one fans.
Speaker 1 (41:00):
And also I think both these movies don't really explain
like how a race weekend works. For instance, like you're
gonna be very confused if you show up on like
just a Sunday to watch en F one race and
you're like, wait a second.
Speaker 5 (41:11):
Can we also talk about his nickname Joe the Hummer Tonto?
Speaker 2 (41:15):
Yes, what are your thoughts on the hummer?
Speaker 5 (41:18):
So we find out that he's called Joe the Hummer
Tonto because when he drives close to the limit or
close to the edge, he starts humming. And according to
Urban Dictionary, a hummer is even better than a blowjob.
It is when a person actually hums and vibrates their
lips with their mouth around your member. There was a
(41:38):
very funny scene towards the end of the movie and
there's a fan in the stands that's holding a sign
that says, keep humming Joe.
Speaker 1 (41:59):
When all was said and Driven was a commercial failure
at the box office. It grossed thirty two million dollars
against a budget of seventy.
Speaker 2 (42:06):
Two to ninety four million dollars.
Speaker 1 (42:09):
Out so then eventually twenty thirteen, this is twelve years
after the movie totally bombed, Rennie Harland did a redditt
ama where a user literally asked him, can you give
any explanation as to why Driven was so awful?
Speaker 3 (42:22):
What an amazing question?
Speaker 1 (42:23):
And Harlan, being the true Finn that he is, gave
a very direct response and I quote Driven was a
sum of many parts and without ducking the blame which
I share in it was a situation where there were
too many chefs in the kitchen. I really don't want
to point fingers. The lesson I learned is don't ever
make a movie for the wrong reasons. I love the
(42:44):
old fashioned real time action when stunt men were men
and the crew was running scared. When computer generation makes
everything possible, including the creation of actors, reality often goes
out the window.
Speaker 3 (42:55):
Wow, the crew was running scared. I love that line.
Speaker 1 (42:59):
I have some questions about a workplace safety based on that.
I see what he was getting at.
Speaker 3 (43:04):
I mean, you have to admire is taking responsibility.
Speaker 2 (43:07):
He's really honest.
Speaker 3 (43:08):
I love this answer.
Speaker 4 (43:09):
Yeah, you know, but I have to tell you, Lily
go on. Unquestionably, it is a bad movie. It is
a very bad movie, but it's a bad movie that's
very fun to watch. It has that going for it.
And the current F one movie titled F one already
what a terrible name. It's also a very bad movie
(43:31):
with a predictable plot and a ridiculous script and all
these big names that are acting terribly, but it doesn't
have that, you know, fun bad movie thing going for it.
It's just straight up a bad movie.
Speaker 1 (43:44):
So what you're saying is the F one movie to
you is a little soulless.
Speaker 4 (43:48):
It's soulless, and I would argue that it is the
worst motorsport movie of all time, and not Driven, because
Driven is so bad that it's kind of good and
F one is just just bad.
Speaker 1 (43:58):
Can I make a suggestion, though, if you want to
see a movie that I think actually shows F one
cars in all of their racing glory.
Speaker 6 (44:06):
From mcglamour Capitals of Europe comes the exciting drama of
the men and the women who live the passionate adventure
of Grand pre Erasing.
Speaker 1 (44:16):
That movie actually came out decades ago, and that is
the nineteen sixty six film Grand.
Speaker 6 (44:21):
Prix Metro Goldwyn Mayer director John Frankenheimer and cinerama, take
you out of the grandstand and hurve you into the
most exciting experience of your life.
Speaker 3 (44:32):
Huh, never seen it?
Speaker 1 (44:33):
Most people haven't. And if we look at the years here,
nineteen sixty six, Bertie ecclestone did not have his clause
his talents into the F one broadcasting and distribution rights,
so they got access. They made a great film. It
is three hours long though, so definitely definitely be prepared.
All right, that's our show for today. A huge thank
(44:55):
you to James Koker for his motorsports and movie knowledge.
The Borrowing Grand Prix is no longer happening this year
due to the conflict in the Middle East, but we'll
still be putting out an episode on April eighth as
we planned.
Speaker 2 (45:06):
We've got a real heater on deck.
Speaker 1 (45:07):
We'll be going through one of the most consequential driver
strikes in F one history.
Speaker 2 (45:13):
We have one man, upon hearing that he was going
to be fired, freaked out and apparently climbed out the
window of the bathroom.
Speaker 1 (45:21):
No Grip is hosted by me Lily Herman and produced,
edited and sound designed by Johai Metal. Max Miller is
our executive producer. We get additional production support from Poldo.
Special thanks to Ben Riskin at Room Tone at iHeart.
Sean titne is Executive producer. Be sure to give this
show a five star rating and review. Wherever you're listening.
(45:42):
You can follow me at Lily k Herman on Instagram
and subscribe to my F one culture newsletter at Engine
Failure f one dot com.
Speaker 2 (45:49):
And you can
Speaker 1 (45:50):
Follow us at No Grip Podcast on Instagram and TikTok
Okay, so several years ago I became very obsessed with
trying to discover the best and worst motorsports movies ever made.
Of course you did, and eventually I stumbled upon several
message board threads proclaiming that Driven, the two thousand and
one film directed by Rennie Harlan and starring Sylvester Stallone.
Speaker 2 (00:18):
Was really bad, like how bad, like really bad. So
immediately I was intrigued.
Speaker 1 (00:25):
Summarizing the plot of Driven is a fool's errand, but
I'm going to try anyway. The basics are that Sylvester
Stallone stars as Joe Tanto, a racing driver who comes
out of retirement to mentor a promising young rookie named
Jimmy Bly in the middle of a motorsports championship.
Speaker 3 (00:39):
Sounds solid enough to me.
Speaker 2 (00:41):
Yes, you're still with me right now?
Speaker 1 (00:43):
YOHI. However, everything after this point makes absolutely no sense, so.
Speaker 2 (00:47):
Feel free to speed up the tape. Okay, here we go.
Speaker 1 (00:51):
Robert Tron Leonard of Dead Poets Society Fame plays Jimmy's
perpetually agitated brother de Mil, who emphatically shouts ninety percent
of his lines for no reason. Estella Warren, who's at
the center of a quasi love triangle between Jimmy and
his rival. Boe Brandenburg played by Til Schweiger, does what
feels like an hour's long synchronized swimming routine in the middle.
Speaker 2 (01:09):
Of the film.
Speaker 3 (01:10):
I Love Synchronized swimmer.
Speaker 1 (01:11):
Burt Reynolds is a team principal who's in a wheelchair
for reason that are never actually revealed.
Speaker 2 (01:15):
A woman named Lucretia Creesia.
Speaker 1 (01:17):
Yes, Lucretia pops in and out and I don't get
what her deal is. There are also about one hundred
car crashes that should have left everybody in this movie
dead on impact, and the amount of CGI in here
is truly maddening.
Speaker 3 (01:27):
The end wow.
Speaker 1 (01:29):
So based on all of that, it is probably not
surprising that Driven didn't do well at the box office
and continues to be a bit of a joke in
the motorsports fandom. So my questions are thus, how did
a movie that has a household name as at star,
a successful director, and a pile of money goes so wrong?
Speaker 2 (01:47):
Was it even really their fault?
Speaker 1 (01:50):
And could a recent Formula one blockbuster reveal a big
reason why Dribbon did not work? Yohan, much as I
appreciate your opinions. I do not think you are the
person to unravel all of these mysteries.
Speaker 4 (02:03):
With never miss an opportunity to put me down to
you movie.
Speaker 1 (02:07):
Okay, when it comes to unpacking this particular cinematic disaster,
I thought I needed someone who was schooled on both
Hollywood and motorsports, and I could think of no one
better than James Koker, who, among the many hats he wears,
is an actor, a podcaster, and an incredibly funny motorsports
content creator.
Speaker 2 (02:25):
So James, welcome to No Grip.
Speaker 3 (02:27):
Well, and thanks so much for having me.
Speaker 5 (02:29):
It's a real treat, big fan of Angion failure, and
to get to sit here and talk to you, it's
an honor really.
Speaker 1 (02:35):
Okay, So before we go any further, I do want
to get one thing out of the way. You don't
have to have seen Driven to listen to or enjoy
this episode. In fact, while we do talk about the plot,
I don't really think we can spoil much about this movie,
seeing as it really doesn't have much substance.
Speaker 4 (02:52):
Yeah, but I think I think after you listen, you're
gonna want to go and watch it.
Speaker 1 (02:55):
You know what, Get a glass of wine, get some
popcorn like Olivia Poe, and then just sit down and
let it wash over you. I am so unimaginably excited
for this episode. I just this movie was an experience.
So the first question I will ask you, James, is
if you had to describe your overall experience watching this
movie in three words, what would they be.
Speaker 5 (03:17):
I'll give you one word, and it was nostalgic because
I remember seeing this movie in the theaters when I
was fifteen years old, and I actually loved this movie
as a teenager. But I also I love bad movies.
It's very hard for me to hate a movie, regardless
of how critically received it is.
Speaker 3 (03:36):
Yeah, so what did you?
Speaker 2 (03:37):
Yeah? What did you like about it?
Speaker 5 (03:38):
As a teen I didn't know a lot about motorsports,
so I had nothing to compare it to. And you know,
as a like fourteen or fifteen year old kid, like
fast cars, grid.
Speaker 1 (03:49):
Girls an obsolete concept now they no longer do grid girls.
Speaker 5 (03:54):
It had everything like a kid with raging hormones wanted.
Speaker 3 (03:57):
Do you know what I mean?
Speaker 1 (03:58):
I'm laughing because right before this me, Max and Joe
had a meeting and Yohai's first comment on this movie was,
I watched it with my sons and they liked it.
Speaker 2 (04:09):
Yeah, it is a good kids movie.
Speaker 4 (04:10):
Kids have a better ability to suspend disbelief. Yeah, they're
kind of idiots in that way, like, oh, sure things
are not happening according to physics.
Speaker 3 (04:18):
It doesn't really bother them the same way. I guess.
Speaker 2 (04:21):
I will say.
Speaker 1 (04:21):
There seems to be a crash every thirty seconds in
this movie, which I could see being very fun when
you're young and maybe not as aware of what actually happens.
Speaker 5 (04:30):
I am not a person who enjoys seeing crashes in
any motorsport race, and I didn't remember how over the
top the crashes were watching it back as a forty
one year old man. I just kept thinking to myself
how over the top they were. I'm like, you really
didn't need that, Just like a normal crash that you
(04:51):
would see in an IndyCar and F one race is sufficient.
Speaker 1 (04:54):
And every crash was like, it's not just someone going
into a wall, it's like a wall. They tumbled twelve
times and then hit twelve more cars. Somehow all of
the cars are still able to run after that, you know,
for a movie that had so many crashes, like also,
nothing really happens. I think that's like the funniest part
of this whole thing.
Speaker 4 (05:12):
I don't want to like give spoilers here or anything
like that, but I was almost surprised that there there
wasn't like some kind of an alligator, you know, something
like that evolved right true.
Speaker 1 (05:21):
Before we dive into the pre production, production, filming, and
everything else that happened in this movie, I will give
the quick log line that is on IMDb for this
as well as another movie's log line, and like I said,
we will see how these two things come together. So
log line for Driven is, and this is a direct quote,
a young hotshot driver is in the middle of a
championship season and is coming apart at the seams. A
(05:43):
former cart champion is called in to give him guidance.
Speaker 6 (05:47):
You know what.
Speaker 1 (05:47):
That log line I think represents what they were going for. Yeah,
whether or not that was successful, we will get into.
And then I will just say there's another movie's log
line I want to read that is very similar. The
log line reads a form one driver comes out of
retirement to mentor and team up with a younger driver,
and that is the f one movie right Anyway, before
(06:07):
we even get into the movie itself a little bit
about the guy who's responsible for this whole production, and
that is Sylvester Stallone.
Speaker 5 (06:14):
A lot of people don't realize that he has written
so many of the films that he's been in, and
he is actually prolific. And I think the reason he
wrote Rocky was because he wasn't getting any parts in Hollywood.
And so, regardless of what you think of Sylvester Stillone
as an actor, he has been able to essentially make
(06:35):
a career for himself for decades.
Speaker 3 (06:37):
And be an icon. And a lot of that is
not luck.
Speaker 5 (06:40):
It's like him creating his own opportunities. So I always
want to give him a lot of credit for that,
for sure.
Speaker 2 (06:46):
And there is a story I read.
Speaker 1 (06:47):
It's probably a little it's been dressed up in like
folklore basically, but some sort of story of you know,
a teacher being like you should you know, your son
can only aim to be like a garbage man or something,
and so he's like, I'm I want to become an
actor and a screenwriter, and that's what I'm going to do.
And then here we are several decades later. That seems
to be seems to be his vibe, but yet so basically,
to fill in a couple of the gaps here, there
are actually two different potential legal names for him. It's
(07:07):
either Sylvester Gardenzio Stallone or Michael Sylvester Gardenzio Stallone, which
I already I think sets the scene of like chaos
for this man. Born July sixth, nineteen forty six in
New York, grew up in Maryland, Washington, d c. And
then Philly. He had a very chaotic family life. His mom, Jackie,
was a celebrity astrologer and women's professional wrestling promoter.
Speaker 2 (07:29):
Oh wow yeah.
Speaker 1 (07:30):
And then his dad, Frank Senior, ran a bunch of
successful hair salons and was also an avid polo player.
Sylvester Stallone did grow up in some foster care and
like boarding care as a young kid, But I think
the thing that best describes who he was as a
young person was in high school he was voted most
likely to end up in the electric chair. Oh my god,
(07:50):
hell of a superlative.
Speaker 5 (07:51):
I was elected most likely to join the circus.
Speaker 2 (07:55):
Okay, that's fun. I got no superlatives.
Speaker 1 (07:57):
I was not, I guess, interesting enough to have that
bestow upon me as a youth, which I guess is fine.
Speaker 5 (08:01):
You know you were too busy being locked in.
Speaker 2 (08:04):
That's true. I was a girl boss.
Speaker 1 (08:05):
I did go through a girl boss era anyway, different
time for Sylvester Stallone who most likely to end up
in the electric chair. The other thing too, that I
think is important about like Sylvester Stallone having kind of
a very specific look and very.
Speaker 2 (08:16):
One of a kind look.
Speaker 1 (08:18):
Part of the reason for that is actually that when
his mother was in labor with him, the doctors used
two pairs of forceps and accidentally severed a nerve, which
led to paralysis in the lower left side of his
face that gives him that perpetually snarling look that he has,
and also slurred his speech a little bit. So yeah,
so a lot of the reason actually he originally got
into bodybuilding and acting was because of bullying he experienced.
Speaker 2 (08:40):
When he was younger. I had no idea.
Speaker 1 (08:42):
Yeah, so really fascinating. He knew from a young age
he wanted to be an actor and a screenwriter. He
eventually moves to New York in the late sixties. He's
struggling for much of the early seventies for the reasons
everyone does, but also because he does have a very
specific look and persona, and then eventually he finds gigantic
success in his breakthrough nineteen seventies six movie Rocky, which
he wrote and starred in, Came Away with Oscar wins.
Speaker 2 (09:05):
No, theca has become a modern classic.
Speaker 4 (09:10):
Maybe you have to get home, We'll get some sleep
and obviously.
Speaker 1 (09:13):
He then proceeds to have a slew of successes in
the nineteen eighties or early nineties as an action star.
Films included Cobra Tango and Cash Demolition Man, The Specialist.
Speaker 2 (09:23):
John Rambo, Rambo.
Speaker 3 (09:24):
A drifter just passing through their town.
Speaker 1 (09:27):
All this to say, by like the mid nineties, Sylvester
Stallone was not quite sure where to go with his career.
A lot of movies are becoming hit or miss. Audience
attitudes and preferences were changing. What it meant to be
an action star was starting to shift. Obviously, other stars
are coming into play. Keanu Reeves, who we know is
an unofficial ambassador to F one and an unofficial mascot
of the Cadillac F one team, really came on the
(09:49):
scene at this point. He's almost twenty years younger than
Sylvester Stallone. Sylvester Stallone was in talks to be in
the movie Speed, which Keanu Reeves obviously ended up starring
in became a huge movie for him. So there's a
real sorry to be like a little bit of a
changing of the guard in the nineties, right, And so
at this point, subsist Alone kind of is in need
of a little bit of.
Speaker 2 (10:07):
A thrust, so to speak.
Speaker 1 (10:08):
As far as where we start our actual journey with Driven,
the movie, cebestost Alone reportedly gets the idea for this
while he's filming a nineteen ninety five sci fi film
called Judge Dread.
Speaker 5 (10:21):
I love that movie as a kid.
Speaker 2 (10:23):
Great, I am the Law, I will say. Other people
claim it's one of his worst movies ever.
Speaker 7 (10:27):
No, Roger, I never have looked at the camera and
talked to an actor. I'm going to break this tradition
right now. I know stallone, you probably hate my God,
so you think I hate you.
Speaker 2 (10:35):
I don't hate you.
Speaker 3 (10:36):
I like your talent.
Speaker 7 (10:37):
I want you to use it. This isn't what you
were put on earth for. You can do this in
your sleep, and sometimes it looks like that's exactly what
you're doing.
Speaker 5 (10:44):
I haven't watched it as an adult, so I don't
know if it holds up in my memory.
Speaker 3 (10:48):
Yes, I have to check it out.
Speaker 1 (10:49):
The important thing with Judge Dread though, is that because
he's filming in Europe, he begins to attend F one
races across the continent, including the nineteen ninety seven Italian
Grand Prix, where he actually it's talking about wanting to
make his own motorsports movie and it's really in the works. However,
I'm sure you noticed that Driven is not taking place
in F one, correct, And it seems like this very
(11:10):
bastardized version of F one meets some sort of like
US based motorsports series. But basically the movie will end
up taking place in the now defunct Championship Auto.
Speaker 2 (11:21):
Racing Teams series. Yes, it would take.
Speaker 1 (11:24):
Us like twelve episodes to go through the history of
that series. It's very complicated. But the big thing to
know is that there's this huge split in the nineties.
There's like two different racing series that are based in
the US. Eventually Kart will cease to exist and IndyCar
is obviously what we are talking about nowadays.
Speaker 5 (11:38):
I will say in the eighties and nineties, Kart was
giving Formula one a run for its money. It was
a Worldwide Series. It was very successful. There at one
point where talks for Kart to purchase Formula One because
Formula one was not doing well. And yeah, eventually there
was the split, which helped aid NASCAR's rise to prominence
(11:58):
of popularity in the United States. And then eventually KRT
Chapionship Auto Racing Teams and IRL Indie Racing League merged
to form what we now know as IndyCar. But I
will say at that time Kart was doing pretty well.
Like a lot of people now compare IndyCar as Walmart
F one, and in some ways that is an accurate description,
(12:20):
even though I love IndyCar despite the whole freedom to
fifty things. Big news out of the nation's capital for
the first time ever, IndyCars will roar through the streets
of Washington. We'll talk about this some other time, but
at the time cart was very popular and very successful.
Speaker 1 (12:36):
I also find Kart interesting because it was like largely
in the US. But then they'd be like, we're going
to Australia, We're going to Brazil, and you'd be like, oh, okay.
Speaker 5 (12:45):
They would do a handful of international races. They would
race in Brazil, Japan, Australia, but it's still at its
core was an American series or a North American series.
Speaker 2 (12:55):
Yeah for sure.
Speaker 1 (12:56):
And so James, why do you think that Sylvester Stallone
ended up to work with Kart and do a movie
around Kart instead of getting to do this big F
one movie that he originally dreamed of.
Speaker 5 (13:08):
Well, I think it was Bernie Ecklestone. Bernie Eckleston is
very hard to work with, ed Bernie.
Speaker 1 (13:16):
Yeah, so Bernie, we're talking about Bernie Ecclestone as a refresher.
He is a British businessman who's very old but still alive,
who really came into power as an F one executive
back in the nineteen seventies and he eventually owned the
rights to the F one brand. So his big innovation
that everyone gives him a lot of credit for is
that he made broadcasters around the world pay a lot
of money for the TV rights to the sport. But
(13:38):
related to that, he also controlled if F one could
be filmed or portrayed in other media, like in movies.
Speaker 5 (13:44):
Bernie Ecklestone, I believe, if I'm remembering correctly, had a
very anti American sentiment. Yes, he did not think American
audiences were refined enough for Formula one.
Speaker 2 (13:54):
He thought we were tacky.
Speaker 1 (13:55):
I mean, anyone who wasn't like a rich white man
from Monaco. He essentially didn't think was like worth his
time or was going to be a good consumer of
the F one product, right, which is also insane because
there's only so many rich white men from Monaco who
like exist in the world and would spend that money.
Speaker 2 (14:09):
Yeah, but anyway, let's get back to Driven.
Speaker 1 (14:12):
So sovests alone is writing this movie that he wants
to be based on Formula one, but he is shut
down by Formula one.
Speaker 5 (14:18):
And I believe I read somewhere that he went through
like twenty five versions of the script and then eventually
Formula one I think passed on it.
Speaker 1 (14:26):
Yeah, Bernie, He's like, no, can't do. You're not getting
any access to anything. You cannot be an Arpaddock.
Speaker 5 (14:31):
So he had to change it to Kart to be
able to get the access to give it the authenticity
that he wanted.
Speaker 1 (14:38):
Again, I will posit here very different than the F
one movie. Twenty five years later. When they want access,
they get it to a point that is almost like
a little bit absurd. Looking back at the F one movie,
but completely polar opposite response. So basically we end up
with a movie that is taking place not F one,
but a lot of the events and incidents and whatnot
are inspired by things that are happening in F one
(15:00):
one at the time.
Speaker 2 (15:00):
And the other thing I'll just.
Speaker 1 (15:01):
Mention too late nineties, early two thousands and F one
was kind of wild looking back, but it's an interesting
era where people are very nostalgic for it. Obviously, you
have the likes of Michael Schumacher.
Speaker 4 (15:11):
Oh Schumacher, the Germany's out of the Australian.
Speaker 1 (15:18):
I'm thinking about these races that Sylvester Stoloneo had been
going to in Europe. You're dealing with the likes of
Damon Hill, Jacque milnev Mika hackinan of course.
Speaker 5 (15:25):
Eddie Irvine who popped up in the Epstein Files.
Speaker 8 (15:28):
When you're famous, say I don't know if you know,
but life becomes a lot easier. You could actually be
you know, you could be quite physically disabled and still
still do well if you're famous.
Speaker 2 (15:41):
Well, you said it, not me.
Speaker 1 (15:42):
I can see why, based on who those guys were,
how they were acting, why Sylvester Stallone would be really
into this, but then yeah, only to be put back
in square one by the fact that F one wants
something to do with him or his movie or whatever
he is working on. So moving forward, Yeah, he ends
up writing twenty five drafts of the script, which I
will say, as a professional writer, twenty five drafts is
(16:03):
too many drafts.
Speaker 2 (16:04):
It's like a bell curve.
Speaker 1 (16:04):
It's gonna get better and then get much much worse
the longer you poken prod it something one. So, James,
this is the part of the episode where I would
usually play a clip for you and for listeners to
hear some of the terrible dialogue in this movie that
came from these twenty five drafts. Unfortunately, we can't do
that because we don't want to be sued. So instead
we have something even better, which is that I have
(16:27):
asked Yohi and our executive producer Max to step into
the studio and take driven script for a spin. So
for context, Max will be playing the role of still
Loan's Joe Tanto and Yohi is the rough and tough
driver Bo Brandenburg played in the movie by Till Schweiger.
Speaker 2 (16:43):
Guys action hy Bo.
Speaker 9 (16:48):
If this is about pride, you better forget it, because
that's how this whole thing started.
Speaker 3 (16:53):
Well, yeah, what would you do me to get.
Speaker 9 (16:56):
Back someone I really loved to get that rock out
of my stumach I'd crawl. You'd crawl, crawl, Joe, you
never crawl. I'd crawl until there's nothing left. Come on,
champ use your head.
Speaker 1 (17:14):
And that is the written masterpiece that comes out of
twenty five draws.
Speaker 2 (17:17):
At this script.
Speaker 5 (17:18):
It reminds me a lot of the F One movie,
where a lot of the dialogue felt pretty unnatural and
forced and cliche. At times, when every two pages a
character has a monologue that feels like an audition to
get into, like an acting conservatory, but it's poorly written,
I feel like you're in for a bumpy ride, both
(17:39):
as like a filmmaker and also as an audience member.
For sure, I don't think Sylvester Saloon, even though he
has been a prolific screenwriter and producer, has been known
for being an excellent writer. Like I think he comes
up with excellent concepts and in the right environment, he
works with collaborators and directors and editors who are able
to take a script into into something great. Yeah, which
(18:01):
I feel like Renny Harland fails to do Yeah.
Speaker 1 (18:03):
When you say Renny Harland, he's the guy who eventually
came on to direct Driven.
Speaker 5 (18:06):
Rendy Harland in this movie often just directed the actors
to yell at each other, for sure. There's a scene
after Memo, who is like the reserve driver for the team,
crashes and Joe Tanto goes back to the garage where
the accident happened to look at Memo's wrecked car, and
then out of nowhere, Burt Reynolds just rolls out of
(18:30):
a dark corner because his character is in a wheelchair,
just rolls out of a dark corner right into a
perfectly placed spotlight, and they start to have a conversation
where they're just yelling back and forth at each other,
and Burt Reynolds was working hard, but his facelift was
working harder. And then there was another scene where Jimmy Bly,
(18:55):
who's this rookie driver, his brother is his like publicist, manager, agent, whatever.
So he finds out that his brother's gone behind his
back and started working with his rival and is conspiring
to replace his own brother on the team. Jimmy says,
why couldn't have you waited just a little longer and
Demil says, because I'm not your waiter, Chef's kiss. There's
(19:19):
just there's a lot of yelling in this movie, and
there's a lot of actors what we would call pushing
in this movie. They're pushing the emotion through instead of
like letting the emotion happen. It's interesting because you see
Robert Sean Lennard doing this, who plays Demil, Jimmy Blis's brother.
And Robert Shawan Lenard is a great actor. I loved
him in Dead Poet's Society House obviously, yes, the house
he was in House forever. He's an unbelievable actor. He's
(19:41):
had a long and storied career. But in this movie,
in almost every scene he does with Kip Prdu, he
is pushing so hard.
Speaker 1 (19:48):
You know what it reminded me of is I had
to take some some like intro acting classes in high
school for like an arts credit.
Speaker 2 (19:54):
I'm a terrible actress. It should be noted.
Speaker 1 (19:56):
My mother after seeing me in like at an acting showcase,
she was like, you were adequate, and I was like,
thank you, mom, that actually is very kind of you. Yeah,
but I just remember that scene that there was a
kid who we were doing a scene from The Odd Couple,
and every scene he would kind of take a dramatic
pause before his lines and then just say that. But
the whole point that the scene we were doing is
we're supposed to be playing poker, right, so it's suposed
to be this very casual and formal environment, and this
(20:17):
guy is he's acting in a completely different production. He
might as well be in Shakespeare, and the rest of
us are just trying to play a poker game. And
that's what a lot of this movie reminded me of.
And there's just a lot of drama held in that
isn't really earned, yes, compared to what the script is
and the action is going on around them. Yeah.
Speaker 5 (20:33):
Another good example of that is Jimmy Blize had one
bad race after winning five, and that's a whole nother
plot hole, because if you had already won five races
out of seven, people would be over the moon about you.
But Robert Shaan Leonard does this monologue where he's like,
you were just this eight year old, goofy looking kid
coming from three blaps behind to be kids twice his age.
(20:54):
He really took a dramatic pause and turned a gear
that wasn't natural at all. He's like, all right, time
to be super dramatic, time to be super thoughtful. This
is me stepping out into the spotlight. And first of all,
that whole speech doesn't make sense because KRT races are
like twenty minutes long, so if you're three laps behind,
there's no way you're getting back. Second, mister screenwriter, beating
(21:15):
kids twice your age is not the flex you think
it is, because unless those go karts are weight corrected,
an eight year old is a serious weight advantage to
someone twice their age in a go kart race.
Speaker 2 (21:26):
Okay, mister physics, Like you know what it is though.
Speaker 1 (21:33):
I So we talked about the twenty five drafts, so
let's just alone. Has started off being like, I'm gonna
write this gritty man's journey through his trials and tribulations,
and he's like having this fall from his career heights.
He's this drunk with problems and his wife is a
mess for a variety of.
Speaker 2 (21:50):
Reasons which we'll get into.
Speaker 1 (21:51):
He ends up with this like ensemble movie where this
character is kind of in that world but not really
like it all just gets so jumbled to where I
think no one quite knows which draft of this movie
almost that they are having to act in.
Speaker 2 (22:03):
He knows what he's making because.
Speaker 1 (22:05):
He's kind of writing about himself, but no one else
was really like in on it.
Speaker 5 (22:08):
I think also what happened with this film is like
the original cut was like four or five hours long, yeah,
or something like that for hours ago, and I think
there are a lot of things that we see in
the final cut of the film that are supposed to
be references to things that we do not see.
Speaker 1 (22:25):
All right, before we pause for some ads, I do
want to remind you that we are a growing show
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don't forget to click that follower subscribe button while you're
at it. Okay, see you after the break ad, breakover,
(22:48):
we're back. So to move on to you've brought him up.
The director of this film is Renny Harlan and so
Soubusterist alone. He has the script, he has a million
drafts of it. It took him four years to get
financing for this movie, and of course he's thinking about director.
So him and Sebestos Stolone had worked together on the
nineteen ninety three action thriller Cliffhanger.
Speaker 2 (23:07):
Which did very well, so good.
Speaker 1 (23:08):
It was the seventh highest grossing film in nineteen ninety three,
so other people also liked it, so obviously they had
a good time working together. It seemed to have gone
well enough.
Speaker 5 (23:17):
And I think I think they were good friends in
real life until after this movie, which we'll talk about later.
Speaker 1 (23:22):
Yes, and Rennie Harlan, he is finished. He is to
this day the most internationally successful finish filmmaker in terms
of revenue.
Speaker 2 (23:30):
But I would say he's the type of guy who.
Speaker 1 (23:32):
Films a lot of movies like a Nightmare on Elm
Street four, Die Hard Too, a lot of sequels to
like successful like action y thriller refranchises from what I
could tell, and then then then like the occasional rom
com like I was like, what is okay?
Speaker 2 (23:46):
Sure?
Speaker 5 (23:46):
Well, the three films that stuck out on his IMDb
to me were die Hard Too, Cliffhanger, and Deep Blue Sea.
Like Deep Blu s is a terrible movie, but I
remember loving it as a kid. I remember ellll cool
Jay's wrap from that movie. Deep as Blue is My
hat is like a sharks fan, and I feel like
a lot of the movies in his filmography are B
(24:07):
movies or like very large budget B movies. They're like
sort of going into the territory of B movies. But
he's always worked. Oh yeah, And he was also briefly
married to Gena Davis for five years, and I saw
on his Wikipedia that they got divorced because he ended
up having a son with Geena Davis's personal assistant. Incredible
content allegedly I don't know, didn't say allegedly in the
(24:32):
Wikipedia sensational he's had quite a colorful life.
Speaker 2 (24:35):
Indeed. The other thing to note, I think of one.
Speaker 1 (24:37):
So he on top of being a guy doing all
of his movie stuff, he's an enormous motorsports fan. And
he was actually working on trying to do a movie
about Ayrton Senna, who tragically killed in a crash in
nineteen ninety four.
Speaker 2 (24:50):
So he was a huge motorsports fan.
Speaker 1 (24:51):
He obviously was keeping up with what was happening on
the track, and famously Rennie harlan Is finished Mika hackinan
won two back to back World Driver's titles in late nineties.
Speaker 4 (25:00):
Oh yeah, it was so easy, you can't believe it.
Speaker 3 (25:04):
No life wasn't.
Speaker 1 (25:05):
So there's no doubt that Rennie Harlan is like aware
that his fellow countryman is killing it in F one
at this exact time when Sylvester Stallone is shopping around
in motorsports movie that he wanted to be an F
one movie. So Rennie Harlan, similar to Sylvester Stallone, is
kind of having like a slightly rough go of it
by the mid nineties. My favorite example of this being
that in nineteen ninety five, Rennie Harlan directed the movie
(25:27):
Cutthroat Island. It is considered one of the biggest box
office bombs of all time. It earned just sixteen million
dollars against a budget somewhere between ninety two to one
hundred and fifteen million dollars.
Speaker 10 (25:38):
I've seen it before. The ships didn't look glamorous. Matthew
Modin and she do not engage each other. I really
wonder about what's going on with Matthew Modine's career because
this was a superior actor, and I think he's just
wasted in a fluff like this.
Speaker 1 (25:51):
Well, all this to say he needed a win, so
he's like, Okay, I want I want to do this
motorsports movie. I love motorsports. I've worked with Sylvester Stallone.
We obviously were very commercially successful. Let's do it. And
then the last thing I'll just note yet we brought
up the casting before and some of the people in it.
Legendary actor Burt Reynolds, he actually owned a NASCAR team
in the eighties, so he is just a motorsports fan
(26:11):
as well. Kip Pardue, I feel like this movie is
like a weird who's who of like the late nineties,
early two thousands, in such a specific way.
Speaker 5 (26:19):
There's a lot of like where are they now? Questions
watching this movie.
Speaker 1 (26:22):
Oh yeah, I also mention Estella Warrant one of the
weirdest sequences in this movie is when her character in
this movie starts doing like a synchronized swimming routine with
Jimmy Blyth.
Speaker 5 (26:34):
When I saw that scene, I immediately thought, I bet
she went to the director and was like, hey, I
really would love that an opportunity to show off my
synchronized swimming skills. I looked up and saw that she
was a champion synchronized swimmer with a Canadian national team.
Speaker 1 (26:48):
Yeah, it was such an extended sequence too, but her
toes were so expertly pointed that I was like, Okay,
this has to be from decades of training, because that
is just not like a natural pose.
Speaker 5 (26:59):
And also the was supposed to be at like a
hotel pool in Japan, but it clearly was like a
hotel pool in Toronto.
Speaker 3 (27:05):
And then they put up.
Speaker 5 (27:06):
A giant Japanese flag because I guess that's what they
do at all hotel pools in Japan, to make it
very clear that we're in Japan. Okay, this is not
La this is not Toronto. Yeah, we're in downtown Tokyo.
Speaker 1 (27:17):
Much of this movie was you didn't want to look
a little too hard at the background because everything would
start falling apart the second you gave it an extra look. Yes,
the editing felt very late nineties early two thousands to me,
but also was simultaneously trying to cover up a bunch
of continuity and other errors to a level and degree
that made no sense.
Speaker 5 (27:35):
I also feel like Rennie Harlan was in love with
the phosphade, where you know, like layering one shot on
top of another, on top of another, top of another.
Another life he would crush it. Directing commercials for Perfume
and cologne because there were like a lot of shots
layered on top of one another, like he couldn't decide
which shot he wanted to use, so he's like, I'm
(27:55):
just going to use all of them at the same time.
Speaker 1 (27:57):
And that's hawnened up with a four hour movie that
then cut into a movie. It's two hours long and
probably just needed to be like forty minutes to be
completely honest, before we just head into like filming in
post production, just the quick recap of where we are
at this point. We have Sebestos alone who decides to
write a motorsports movie about a motorsports series that he's
not allowed to talk about or film around. He wrote
about it across two dozen drafts. He's working with a
(28:20):
director who's going through a really hit or miss period.
They together are about to shoot a highly technical film.
No one quite knows exactly what they are supposed to
be acting in, or the tone or literally anything that's happening,
because also a lot of it's going to be CGI okay,
So that's where we're at going.
Speaker 2 (28:34):
Into totally the actual production.
Speaker 1 (28:36):
The main cast started filming July two thousand, but a
lot of the filming took place before that around various
KRT races. We do see cameos of different actual racing
drivers of the time. All told, the movie shot over
eight months and nine races in five countries, and the
studio at the time and some of their press releases
boasted that driven utilized state of the art technology to
(28:57):
simulate the driver's point of view while traveling. It speeds
in excess of two hundred and forty miles per hour,
which I will point out also sounds a lot like
some of the F one movie marketing a quarter century later.
Speaker 3 (29:10):
For sure.
Speaker 1 (29:11):
The other thing, as we've mentioned, because this wasn't F one,
it was Kart, but also they weren't really calling it
kart per se. We got this kind of bizarre like
semi generic open wheel racing motorsports world. It's just kind
of like it is motor sports, like that's but that's
that's it.
Speaker 5 (29:27):
There were times where you could barely see the KRT
branding in the background, but they never called it kart outright,
which was confusing.
Speaker 1 (29:34):
Yeah, you're just like, truly, this makes no sense. And
the other big thing that I think speaks to all
the a bunch of other issues they had on top
of the script on top of you know, Rennie Harlan's
direction is that there are over three thousand camera setups
in this movie. For instance, in the rainy Germany race.
It's one of a billion different potential climaxes in this movie.
But anyway, they had the issue of having to keep
(29:56):
the crew safe. But then also they'd worry about keeping
the electron extry because they were dealing with what was
called a relentless deluge of water from rain spinners to
make all of that happen, also further jacking up the
cost of this movie. Production had its own fleet of
sixteen race cars, including a two seater race car that
Rennie Harlan employed to create the illusion of the actors
(30:17):
driving the cars at one hundred and fifty miles an hour.
Just a very cumbersome production.
Speaker 5 (30:21):
Apparently on the DVD you can watch like a longer
cut that has like an additional fifty one minutes in it. Yes,
but you can't see the original four hour cut anywhere else.
Speaker 1 (30:32):
Yes, there's a missing hour ten that we'll never know about.
Speaker 3 (30:35):
I would love to see it, you would.
Speaker 1 (30:36):
I'm like, I don't know if I need that personally,
just in my life We're going to take a break
for some ads. I promise this won't be as long
as Driven's four hour director's cut. We're back and we're
talking about the worst motorsports movie of all time. Okay,
so the movie comes out in two thousand and one.
(30:59):
I will note that the official tagline for Warner Brothers
is welcome to the human race.
Speaker 3 (31:04):
I love it.
Speaker 1 (31:07):
On a more dour note. Another thing I just wanted
to mention. In February of two thousand and ones, this
is two months before the movie's release, an exotic dancer
filed a lawsuit accusing Sylvester Stallone of rape in two thousand,
so this was kind of at least in the news
around the time where they're trying to start ramping up promotion,
and you know, movie posters would be out things like that,
So that all of that is kind of unfolding as
promos and going underway that this movie eventually does premiere,
(31:31):
and once again, in a move that sounds like something
very close to the F one Movies promotion, this premiere
includes real life cart drivers racing around and demonstrating pit
stops in modified champ cars down Hollywood Boulevard.
Speaker 2 (31:44):
Cool, Yeah, you went to the F one premiere I did.
Speaker 3 (31:47):
In New York. It was great.
Speaker 5 (31:48):
They had a red carpet set up in Times Square, well,
it was a black carpet, and then each team had
a livery represented on that carpet, but they didn't do
pit stops.
Speaker 1 (31:59):
Before we dive into to what everyone else said about
this movie, we've been talking about your thoughts on it
throughout in certain scenes and whatnot. But yeah, overarchingly, how
did you feel about Driven now that you have seen
it both as an adolescent an adult.
Speaker 5 (32:13):
Watching it as adult, I feel like the movie lacked
realistic motivation throughout the film. So you start off with
the first scene where you see Bob Brandenburg fighting with
his girlfriend Sophia played by Stella Wardon. He's having a
bad season and he's blaming his girlfriend on an distraction.
(32:34):
But when you watch the montage at the getting the movie,
he's still getting on podiums. There were times where like
I was unable to believe the reality of the movie. Demil,
who is Jimmy Bli's manager and publicist, was on the
radio talking to him in the car, and I'm like,
they would never let that happen in a race.
Speaker 1 (32:49):
Oh, everybody talked to everyone on the headset like on Mike.
I was like, why is everyone allowed to be talking
to drivers like mid rate?
Speaker 5 (32:59):
Jason at Zukus wrote, why does everybody have headphone privileges
in this movie?
Speaker 2 (33:05):
It's true? What okay about ball? Else?
Speaker 1 (33:08):
May I just say a brief aside consider the fact
that this logline is like this curmudgeon comes back to
mentor a young cocky driver or whatever. There is almost
no mentorship going on. I feel like Jimmy Bly and
Joe Tanto have like six lines total together throughout this
whole movie.
Speaker 5 (33:22):
I wouldn't be surprised if some of the stuff that
ended up on the cutting room floor was what you
are saying is missing from this film.
Speaker 1 (33:30):
That is exactly what I thought as well, because I
was like, man, I am missing the part where this
guy is met yea, I'm missing the montage like them
becoming buddies over several races and them bonding at a
bar or something that they do.
Speaker 5 (33:42):
Give me the Rocky Balboa Apollo Creed training montage where
they're like running on the beach and then jumping into waves,
hugging each other while jumping up and down. That's what
I want between Joe Tanto and Jimmy Blide.
Speaker 2 (33:52):
Also again with the we had Joe and Bow, We've
got Joe and Jimmy.
Speaker 3 (33:56):
Like.
Speaker 1 (33:58):
You know what Milldamil like Damil at this point, I'm like,
dam Demila and Lucretia are fine apparently, and then they're
just Kathy and You're like okay, yeah, Like but the
overarchingly in an effort to like do too much the
actual just like basic like this curmudgeon come to this
young guy. They bond and then there's like a lesson,
like we missed that sort of core thing that just
(34:20):
had to happen.
Speaker 2 (34:21):
It just wasn't there. At the end of the day.
He's also not that much of a curmudgeon.
Speaker 5 (34:25):
Joe Tanto is a very like personal friendly person. Yeah,
in this entire movie.
Speaker 1 (34:29):
If anything, the Burt Reynolds character, he's a little more mysterious.
I kind of had to piece together what the backstory
was there, because they just are like, yeah, here's Burt Reynolds,
the team principal, and something happened to him.
Speaker 5 (34:39):
I imagine that the detail of Carl Henry being in
the wheelchair was from the original F one script and
probably was a tribute to or a reference to Frank Williams.
Speaker 2 (34:49):
Yep, I could see that. That's my assumption.
Speaker 5 (34:51):
I also think the scene where Jimmy and Joe Tanto
save Memo might be a reference to Ayrton Senna saving
Eric Kumas and free practice during the nineteen ninety two
Belgian Grand Prix ooh Agel. Senna was the first to
reach the scene of the crash and he rushed to
help the motionless Frenchman where he stopped his car, got
out and saved Eric Comas's life. But you're right, we
(35:15):
never get a reference or understand why he's in that chair.
Speaker 2 (35:19):
And I mean, it's for Renolds. He's trying, he's trying
it to your point, he's trying real hard, but it's
just it's just like it's just not coming together.
Speaker 1 (35:27):
And I will say critics at the time said basically
everything that we're saying. So I actually put together a
few snippets from reviews back in two thousand and one.
The first one is from Rita Kempley at The Washington Post,
and she wrote, there are two lessons here. One skip
the movie and two find out who Reynold's plastic surgeon is.
And don't make an appointment. And then Kembley's colleague Michael
(35:48):
O'Sullivan also wrote that it's like a music video shot
by a cops camera crew on crystal meth. And then
we had Owen Glieberman from Entertainment Weekly describing the movie
as mostly preposterous, and he also added that it has
no dramatic center.
Speaker 5 (36:03):
Sounds familiar to many of the reviews from a more
recent murder sport film.
Speaker 2 (36:08):
A much more recent one.
Speaker 1 (36:12):
And then one of my favorites came from USA Today's
Mike Clark, who wrote that Driven was a race car
drama full of flashy but empty images and a soundtrack
that makes you feel as if you're being shaken on
a motel rumble bed.
Speaker 5 (36:25):
Well, that probably is in reference to the music, which
was by BT, who is an American artist in the
electronic music genre who is often credited as a pioneer
of trance and intelligent dance music that paved the way
for EDM. And when I read that sentence, I was like,
I don't know if he wrote that himself or not.
Some of the songs in the movie are like dark,
ominous tones. Some feel like they're like knockoffs. Of the
(36:48):
Blood Raves song from Blade. Some of the songs sound
like they're off the soundtrack of like a a Japanese RPG.
When you're just exploring the open world. The music is
all over the place.
Speaker 2 (36:58):
I will say, to its credit, it is very late nineties.
Speaker 5 (37:00):
There's one song from the soundtrack though, that remains to
be one of my favorite songs ever, and that is
Mother Bye Era. It's like an electronic dance song that
has like Gregorian Chance with it or something like that.
And that song plays right before the very last race
of the film, which is at bell Isle outside of Detroit,
(37:21):
and that song remains to be like one of my
most favorite songs in the history of my life. I
love that song. I will stop what I'm doing and
listen to it.
Speaker 1 (37:29):
I'm glad you least got some enjoyment not otherwise found
in this film.
Speaker 5 (37:34):
Out of that, I will also say, watching this movie
and looking at all the branding on the cars, and
this might be a very controversial take, but I'm just
gonna say it, bring cigarettes back to racing. Let's get
rid of sports betting, let's get rid of AI, and
just bring back cigarettes. At least cigarettes are cool. I
(37:54):
don't smoke, but I love cigarette branding. There's something very
cool and sexy about it.
Speaker 1 (38:00):
Well, because their branding has to work or else the
whole product, whereas like AI, they don't.
Speaker 5 (38:04):
Yeah, but you'll always look cool smoking a cigarette, you'll
never look cool. Like asking chat GPT, how long you
have to boil fetichini for?
Speaker 2 (38:13):
How long do you have to boil fetacini for? I
don't know, let's ask what a fun idea?
Speaker 3 (38:20):
Sounds like you're cooking up a feast.
Speaker 1 (38:22):
To cook fetticini, start by boiling well salted water next. Okay,
So to wrap up, like the PostScript of this of
this movie, in terms of accolades, to no one's surprise,
no oscars, nothing of a claim. I did get seven
nominations for the twenty second Golden Raspberry Awards the Razzies.
Estella Warren one worse Supporting actress, but it was for
(38:42):
both Driven and then the movie Planet of the.
Speaker 2 (38:44):
Apes, so she had a year rough rough.
Speaker 1 (38:47):
To be Estella Warren and then on the motorsports side
of things, Kart dissolved just two years later, in two
thousand and three, after more than a decade of particularly
messy legal disputes and financial woes, and today we enjoy
the Car series instead.
Speaker 4 (39:02):
How did you call it the Walmart F one people?
Speaker 3 (39:06):
I don't call it that.
Speaker 5 (39:07):
People call it Walt F one, which sometimes feels accurate
because it does operate on a much smaller budget, and
you would say a lot of the brands and partners
that operate within that space aren't as premium or luxury
as the ones you would see in Formula One. But
I still like IndyCar very much.
Speaker 1 (39:26):
Whenever I talk to non Americans about IndyCar, the fact
that there are commercial breaks during an IndyCar race is
something that like they are up all frustrating, Yeah, which
also just feels a little F one.
Speaker 2 (39:36):
Walmart like F one would never do.
Speaker 3 (39:37):
That to us, or if they didn't, will stop the race.
Speaker 1 (39:40):
No, the race is going on, and they'll sometimes either
just go to a commercial or they'll put the race
in like a tiny box in the corner and the
commercial plays out, kind of like in football when they
do this in the NFL.
Speaker 4 (39:49):
But what if something happens, will they like cut to
the commercials?
Speaker 5 (39:52):
Nope, But Americans cut to commercial for everything. We cut
to commercial during the insurrection on January sixth, like there
are people storming the cap On, attacking police officers, and
then we get a double box on CNN and be
like Whopper, Whopper, Whopper, Whopper, Whopper Whopper.
Speaker 1 (40:08):
On this note, though, the thing I'll mention is that
obviously it does not appear that this movie, given what
we know about Kart dissolving two years later, didn't do
anything for Kart as a brand. And yes, part of
that is the fact that, like the motorsports series in
this movie is very generic and we never quite know
what it actually is supposed to be. But I also
again bring it back to the f A movie. I
will say the big question that remains right now is like, Okay,
(40:31):
Apple Studios and F one spent somewhere between two hundred
fifty to three hundred million dollars making and marketing this movie,
and will that actually move the.
Speaker 2 (40:37):
Needle at all for F one? Right Like?
Speaker 1 (40:40):
Did it actually bring in new fans? It's remained to
be seen what they got out of it as far
as a fan base.
Speaker 5 (40:47):
I think they were hoping it would replicate the success
that Drive or Survive brought the series. I think it
maybe caused new fans to maybe watch a race or two,
But I don't think it converted that many people into
being full time.
Speaker 2 (40:59):
For me the one fans.
Speaker 1 (41:00):
And also I think both these movies don't really explain
like how a race weekend works. For instance, like you're
gonna be very confused if you show up on like
just a Sunday to watch en F one race and
you're like, wait a second.
Speaker 5 (41:11):
Can we also talk about his nickname Joe the Hummer Tonto?
Speaker 2 (41:15):
Yes, what are your thoughts on the hummer?
Speaker 5 (41:18):
So we find out that he's called Joe the Hummer
Tonto because when he drives close to the limit or
close to the edge, he starts humming. And according to
Urban Dictionary, a hummer is even better than a blowjob.
It is when a person actually hums and vibrates their
lips with their mouth around your member. There was a
(41:38):
very funny scene towards the end of the movie and
there's a fan in the stands that's holding a sign
that says, keep humming Joe.
Speaker 1 (41:59):
When all was said and Driven was a commercial failure
at the box office. It grossed thirty two million dollars
against a budget of seventy.
Speaker 2 (42:06):
Two to ninety four million dollars.
Speaker 1 (42:09):
Out so then eventually twenty thirteen, this is twelve years
after the movie totally bombed, Rennie Harland did a redditt
ama where a user literally asked him, can you give
any explanation as to why Driven was so awful?
Speaker 3 (42:22):
What an amazing question?
Speaker 1 (42:23):
And Harlan, being the true Finn that he is, gave
a very direct response and I quote Driven was a
sum of many parts and without ducking the blame which
I share in it was a situation where there were
too many chefs in the kitchen. I really don't want
to point fingers. The lesson I learned is don't ever
make a movie for the wrong reasons. I love the
(42:44):
old fashioned real time action when stunt men were men
and the crew was running scared. When computer generation makes
everything possible, including the creation of actors, reality often goes
out the window.
Speaker 3 (42:55):
Wow, the crew was running scared. I love that line.
Speaker 1 (42:59):
I have some questions about a workplace safety based on that.
I see what he was getting at.
Speaker 3 (43:04):
I mean, you have to admire is taking responsibility.
Speaker 2 (43:07):
He's really honest.
Speaker 3 (43:08):
I love this answer.
Speaker 4 (43:09):
Yeah, you know, but I have to tell you, Lily
go on. Unquestionably, it is a bad movie. It is
a very bad movie, but it's a bad movie that's
very fun to watch. It has that going for it.
And the current F one movie titled F one already
what a terrible name. It's also a very bad movie
(43:31):
with a predictable plot and a ridiculous script and all
these big names that are acting terribly, but it doesn't
have that, you know, fun bad movie thing going for it.
It's just straight up a bad movie.
Speaker 1 (43:44):
So what you're saying is the F one movie to
you is a little soulless.
Speaker 4 (43:48):
It's soulless, and I would argue that it is the
worst motorsport movie of all time, and not Driven, because
Driven is so bad that it's kind of good and
F one is just just bad.
Speaker 1 (43:58):
Can I make a suggestion, though, if you want to
see a movie that I think actually shows F one
cars in all of their racing glory.
Speaker 6 (44:06):
From mcglamour Capitals of Europe comes the exciting drama of
the men and the women who live the passionate adventure
of Grand pre Erasing.
Speaker 1 (44:16):
That movie actually came out decades ago, and that is
the nineteen sixty six film Grand.
Speaker 6 (44:21):
Prix Metro Goldwyn Mayer director John Frankenheimer and cinerama, take
you out of the grandstand and hurve you into the
most exciting experience of your life.
Speaker 3 (44:32):
Huh, never seen it?
Speaker 1 (44:33):
Most people haven't. And if we look at the years here,
nineteen sixty six, Bertie ecclestone did not have his clause
his talents into the F one broadcasting and distribution rights,
so they got access. They made a great film. It
is three hours long though, so definitely definitely be prepared.
All right, that's our show for today. A huge thank
(44:55):
you to James Koker for his motorsports and movie knowledge.
The Borrowing Grand Prix is no longer happening this year
due to the conflict in the Middle East, but we'll
still be putting out an episode on April eighth as
we planned.
Speaker 2 (45:06):
We've got a real heater on deck.
Speaker 1 (45:07):
We'll be going through one of the most consequential driver
strikes in F one history.
Speaker 2 (45:13):
We have one man, upon hearing that he was going
to be fired, freaked out and apparently climbed out the
window of the bathroom.
Speaker 1 (45:21):
No Grip is hosted by me Lily Herman and produced,
edited and sound designed by Johai Metal. Max Miller is
our executive producer. We get additional production support from Poldo.
Special thanks to Ben Riskin at Room Tone at iHeart.
Sean titne is Executive producer. Be sure to give this
show a five star rating and review. Wherever you're listening.
(45:42):
You can follow me at Lily k Herman on Instagram
and subscribe to my F one culture newsletter at Engine
Failure f one dot com.
Speaker 2 (45:49):
And you can
Speaker 1 (45:50):
Follow us at No Grip Podcast on Instagram and TikTok
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Ding dong! Join your culture consultants, Matt Rogers and Bowen Yang, on an unforgettable journey into the beating heart of CULTURE. Alongside sizzling special guests, they GET INTO the hottest pop-culture moments of the day and the formative cultural experiences that turned them into Culturistas. Produced by the Big Money Players Network and iHeartRadio.