Hi I’m Ethan Bayes and welcome to my first blog post, today I am going to be talking about one of my favourite movies, Baby Driver. (Its my banner image)

SPOILERS AHEAD

Baby Driver is a 2017 film written and directed by Edgar Wright. You may know him for directing such films as Shaun of the Dead, Hot Fuzz and Scott Pilgrim vs The World. This film was Edgars first solo written film, as before he had collaborated with Simon Pegg on the Cornetto Trilogy and Michael Bacall on Scott Pilgrim vs The World. Wright has said he first had the idea for the film when he was 21 in 1995, however with such a small budget he knew that he could not create the film. The first attempt at this film can be seen in the 2003 music video for the song “Blue Song” by Mint Royale, Wright directed this video which starred Noel Fielding and future cornetto trilogy star Nick Frost among others. In the video a getaway driver is listening to music in his car with the action happening in time with the song. It is said he started writing the script in 2007, having a table read later on where the only actors staying in the role they read for was Jon Hamm as Buddy. Emma Stone was originally meant to play the love interest “Deborah” in the film but instead passed the film up for La La Land. Instead Lily James played the role. Wright chose Ansel Elgort to be the main character as he was only 22 when the film was made, making him the baby of the cast, also he can sing, write music and DJ.

One thing that really impressed me in this film is the small details and foreshadowing that Wright includes. This can been seen in all of his films not just this one which gives you an incentive to go back and watch them again to see what you missed the first time around. Every movement in this film goes along with the music playing in the background, this includes gun shots and footsteps, also all the music in this film is diegetic as it is playing either through headphones or a speaker. Wright uses small details to warm us to the character of Buddy before he turns evil and wants to get revenge on Baby for his wife “Darling” dying early on in the film. There are a few ways he does this, one way is very subtle, in the opening car scene Baby has just made the cops follow a different red car and Buddy – who is in the back seat – pats Baby on the shoulder. This tells us that he has a strong connection to Baby as you would not just do this to a random person. He strengthens this idea later on when Buddy stands up for Baby when Bats is insulting him for always listening to music, they share a bonding moment which almost feels like a father and son moment when they discover a song they both like in “Brighton Rock” by Queen. The final reason is extremely subtle, Buddy has facial hair and it is said that characters with facial hair are more likely to be trustworthy, so subconsciously we are trusting this character. Another subtle detail that I love is in the opening scene of this film. Baby gets sucked into his world of music once the three other characters leave the car, however a police car drives past to break this illusion. You then see a close up of Baby looking worryingly into the bank, the viewers don’t know it yet but this is foreshadowing the issue of Baby not wanting to hurt anybody by continuing this line of work. (Yet he is forced to) The final small detail that I will talk about in this part of my post is Wright including a small lyric video into one of the scenes of this film. I did not notice this on my first viewing but just after the first heist when Baby is coming back from getting coffee, the lyrics to the song he is listening to show up in his surrounding environment. If you did not notice this the first time it is well worth going back and watching that scene again.

Another thing that I love about this film is how Wright gives each character a colour. Baby is black and white, these are the two colours which you seem him wearing most in the movie, normally a white t-shirt with a black jacket over the top. These colours are meant to represent how Baby sees the world around him, but I also believe that it represents how others view him. He does not speak or interact well with others – especially because he has to listen to music to drown out the sound of his tinnitus – so people may see him as a bland or boring person who just blends in with every day life just like the colours black and white. A clever detail that Hoffman has added to this film, as Baby gets sucked in to this world of crime his once white t-shirt gets darker and darker. His love interest in the film, Deborah, has the colour yellow. I believe this is because she is a very innocent character, she has never done anything wrong yet she gets dragged into this world of crime. Bats, played by Jamie Fox, has the colour red, this is because he is a crazy, unhinged character who could snap at any moment, just like a bull when he sees red. He is also potentially dangerous and red has the connotation of danger. Darling has the colours Pink and Purple which again shows innocence with the pink but it may also hint at a darker side with the purple. Finally Buddy has the colour Blue which is normally seen as a fairly neutral colour which again may be a subtle hint that Wright gave the audience to try and persuade them into trusting this character. All of this adds up to not only add more meaning to every layer of this film but also to blend in with the already vibrant use of colour in the film.

In conclusion I love Baby Driver for one main reason and that is the amount of detail that is put into every scene. There is never a dull scene in the entire film and this is thanks to Wrights amazing writing and directing skills.

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