Drive-Away Dolls (Ethan Coen, 2024) wr. Ethan Coen, Tricia Cooke (Ethan's wife); dp Ari Wegner; Margaret Qualley, Geraldine Viswanathan, Beanie Feldstein, Colman Domingo, Pedro Pascal, Matt Damon, Bill Camp, Joey Slotnick; 84 min. Jamie, an uninhibited free spirit bemoaning yet another breakup with a girlfriend, and her demure friend Marian desperately needs to loosen up. In search of a fresh start, the two embark on an impromptu road trip to Tallahassee, but things quickly go awry when they cross paths with a group of inept criminals along the way.
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On the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, 66% of 184 critics' reviews are positive, with an average rating of 6.2/10. The website's consensus reads: "The appealing odd-couple chemistry between Margaret Qualley and Geraldine Viswanathan helps Drive-Away Dolls power past its overly familiar screenplay and erratic execution." Metacritic, which uses a weighted average, assigned the film a score of 57 out of 100, based on 44 critics, indicating "mixed or average" reviews. Audiences surveyed by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "C" on an A+ to F scale, while those polled by PostTrak gave it a 66% overall positive score.
In a negative review, Barry Hertz of The Globe and Mail wrote, "There is a fine line between endearing, breezy silliness and second-hand embarrassment, a border that the undercooked film crosses back and forth over and over again until there's no space left for your eyes to roll."
Tomris Laffly of RogerEbert.com gave the film 3.5/4 stars and wrote, "Sometimes, there is the slightest air of obviousness in Drive-Away Dolls, which can't avoid inevitable comparisons to older (and better) idiosyncratic crime capers, many of them by the Coens themselves. But that doesn't lessen the nostalgic bliss the film stirs in one with all its foul-mouthed, naughty glory; not when the fun had by everyone involved in the project is so palpable on the screen. In that, there is a disarming what the hell, why not quality to Cooke and Coen's writing, with the carefree words and actions of Jamie and Marian jovially bouncing off the page and landing on the viewers' eyes and ears with the same jubilant vigor."
Garry Gillard | reviews | New: 6 March, 2024 | Now: 6 March, 2024