It’s OK to not like “Drive”

I have very strong opinions about movies. I really like cinema as a medium, so every bad movie is, to me, a wasted opportunity that deserves every bit of ire I can give it. It also helps that I feel like I “get” movies. I don’t “get” books as well as I “get” movies. I can watch and appreciate “Citizen Kane”, “The Godfather” or “Gone With the Wind”, but I just can’t get through “The Karamazov Brothers”.

One exception to this: “The Tree of Life”. I’ll never “get” “The Tree of Life”.

 Because of this, I get irrationally mad when people whose opinion I otherwise respect say that they like a movie that, in my opinion, is terrible, or if they hate a movie that I think is genius. Sometimes, I think my reaction is justified; I can’t be the only one who stopped caring about what Roger Ebert had to say after he gave a good review to “Star Wars: Episode 1”. But at other times, I overreact, and I know it. If you disagree with my movie tastes, I think less of you as a person (hyperbole, calm down…), and I know it doesn’t make sense.

But this only applies to the movies that I think are either exceptionally good or frighteningly bad. If you hate “2001”, we won’t get along. Same if you like “Transformers”. But, as the post title says, it’s alright if you don’t like “Drive”. Or “Where the Wild Things Are”. Or “Pulp Fiction”. Those are among my favourite movies, and as much as I hate to admit it, on a lazy Sunday afternoon, I’d much rather watch them than “Apocalypse Now”, even though I know they’re nowhere near as well-made. And the opposite is also true; it’s alright if you like “The Avengers”, even though I don’t like it. I’m glad that you can appreciate a very well-made waste of time.

That’s why it’s ok to not like “Drive”. It’s stylish, but it’s flawed. It’s stylish enough to make me overlook that it’s flawed, but I can definitely understand how someone could be turned off by the technical details that the movie got wrong, the pacing that’s all over the place, or the soundtrack that, while good, is comprised of 3 songs. And the fact that I love that movie despite its flaws makes it that much more special to me; like it’s a movie made for me specifically, with strengths that I can really appreciate, and flaws that I will gladly overlook.

And I can understand that a movie made for me might not please anyone else.