Drive Angry 3D

With the devil Nicholas Cage has his experience at least since "Ghost Rider". Now, under the direction of "My Bloody Valentine" director Patrick Lussier, he has to pull off another cinematic hell ride. And it's a lot of fun, despite the fairly low level of cleverness in the story.

Cage stars in "Drive Angry" as fugitive criminal John Milton, who is on a bloody quest for revenge. Together with the attractive waitress Piper (Amber Heard), who actually just happened to cross his path, Milton hunts the cult preacher Jonah King (Billy Burke), who killed Milton's daughter and now wants to sacrifice his granddaughter at the next full moon. Milton wants to prevent this with all his might. But not only that the unequal duo through the bloody trail that Milton and the powerful Piper leave behind, the police are constantly breathing down their necks. The mysterious accountant (William Fichtner) is also on their heels. And not without reason, because Milton has escaped not from any prison, but from hell and should also return there immediately. But of course Milton won't be stopped that easily from his quest for revenge.

Brain off and buckle up: "Drive Angry" is a pure fun movie. Pretension and moral sense should just take a break here. Because Lussier has prepared a murderously entertaining battle platter, which works very well on the one hand as a homage to the action films of the 70s, but also as a bloody horror film. In doing so, Lussier doesn't seem to want to compromise. As in "My Bloody Valentine", various body parts fly directly into the auditorium in appetizing 3D optics in his latest work, which obviously has a much higher budget, the optical advantages of some of the actresses are repeatedly unveiled and the dialogues are rarely something for delicate ears. But since the whole thing is presented in such an exaggerated way, you never get the idea to take the whole thing seriously or even to be bothered by the quite questionable morality of the story.

The action fun, shot in 3D, admittedly makes great use of the three-dimensional visuals, which is why they then take center stage in many scenes. But Lussier has also taken great care to ensure that the characters and the action of it are not pushed too far into the background, so the film still works well in 2D. And that's a good thing, because after all, the oft-maligned Nicholas Cage is cooler here than he's been in a long time, even if he's really just embodying another variation of the numerous action characters he's already brought to the screen in recent years, sometimes more, sometimes less successfully. Amber Heard, on the other hand, seems to be just an attractive accessory at first glance, but proves after only a few minutes that she is no less cool and, above all, assertive, which significantly increases the fun factor of this on-screen duo. Piper is just not the fragile princess in distress, but an exceedingly strong young woman who really doesn't put up with anything.

But as good as the two leads are, the secret star of the film is William Fichtner. Known from the TV series "Prison Break" and quite a few supporting roles in blockbusters like "Armageddon" or "The Tempest", the mime delivers a wonderfully sadistic and humorous performance as the hellish accountant, combining stiff bureaucracy and murderous killer instinct in the most original way. Fichtner's performances alone are worth every penny of the movie ticket.

Admittedly, the story of "Drive Angry" certainly won't win any awards for its originality or logical substance. But for a film that so blatantly just wants to be fun and allows genre fans to be entertained to the best of their ability for over 100 minutes of pointless action, a rather thin story can be happily forgiven. Who has a problem with blood, exploding cars, flying body parts and naked women, should avoid this film in any case. But if all these are arguments for a visit to the cinema, you will get your money's worth! Absolutely worth seeing!

An article by Frankfurt-Tipp