Driver's Education
Take Directed by Charles Oliver at Landmarks Sunshine Cinema
Until FXs family-on-the-run series The Riches, Minnie Driver was famous mostly for being famous. Sure, there was Good Will Hunting and a memorable recurring role on Will and Grace, but most movie fans would be hard pressed to name any of her other roles. And what a shame that so much of her potential was wasted all these years, because she delivers a delightfully nuanced performance in the new, twisty thriller Take.
Driving through a washed-out desert while intermittently carrying on a conversation with her young son, Ana (Driver) is on her way to a prison for Sauls execution. And interspersed with scenes of her trip are flashbacks to the day she met Saul when he held up a grocery storea chance encounter that ended in tragedy. Meanwhile, as Saul talks about God and redemption with a priest, flashbacks reveal not only how he ended up bruised and bloodied at the grocery store with a gun but also why Ana makes her annual trek to the prison.
On paper, Take doesnt seem like much; nor does it feel any more substantial as youre watching it. But director/screenwriter Oliver has a few tricks up his sleeve, and he plays them with a precision that might come across as contrived were they not so subtle. And while Take has a few moments of eye-rolling absurdity (the last shot, in particular, is annoying), the film has a way of slithering under your skin and staying there. Even after spending most of the movie correctly guessing what will happen next, Take continues to haunt you for days afterward.
Much of its success is thanks to Driver and Jeremy Renner, as Saul. Thoroughly deglamorized, Drivers Ana was a woman who can only summon up the strength to fight for a better life when it comes to her son; for herself, she was content with cleaning other peoples homes and trudging through her days. Now, Saul has given her a hard-edged anger that has become the driving force in her life, forcing her into a grueling drive with a mini-trailer hitched to the back of her car. And while Sauls scenes with the priest are the films weakest, with both characters spouting tired arguments about redemption and forgiveness, Renner is terrifying and tragic in the flashbacks to Sauls monumentally bad day. Holding his body tense and shifting his eyes from side to side, Renner makes Saul into a pitiable man caught in a situation thats rapidly spinning out of control. Whether hes attempting to hijack a car or desperately robbing the grocery store, Saul is never an out-and-out villain, even as his actions become breathtaking in their audacious cruelty.
But none of the film would work if not for Tristan Whitmans cinematography. Using the same washed-out look for Anas present and Sauls flashbacks and then a more vivid palette for Sauls present and Anas past, Whitmans work suddenly turns a brief series of cuts into the key to the whole film. In that moment, when Ana and Saul meet for the first time since the robbery, the essence of redemption and the need for explanations (and, possibly, self-deception) become clear. And while Take is riddled with clichés and missteps (including Minnie Driver singing a song over the final credits), Olivers final twist elevates the whole project into something more than the usual gimmicky indie film.