License to Drive is a Rite of Passage
Time Capsule
by Kristin Battestella
Colorful
neon road signs and fast moving opening credits set the 1988 mood of
License
to Drive before
cool cars in dangerous chases and a cackling bus driver a la A
Nightmare on Elm Street
as Corey Haim's (The
Lost Boys) Les
Anderson
sleeps
thru the Driver's Ed video.
After
writing “I will drive safely” on the chalkboard as punishment
from a teacher who hopes he never succeeds, Les does indeed fail to
get his license. Naturally, he goes out on the town anyway to impress
his crush Mercedes (Heather Graham), but sneaking out in his
grandfather's Cadillac leads to a disastrous if memorable night for
Les and his friends – wannabe cool Dean (Corey Feldman) and nerdy
Charles (Michael Manasseri) – thanks to the numerous mishaps
befalling Grandpa's precious Caddy.
Debut
director Greg Beeman (Smallville)
has
ninety minutes in License
to Drive and
establishes the premise immediately with double duty dialogue on
crushes, crusty teachers, and the generation gap. Older dudes with
cool cars woo the popular girls, and the sophisticated, wealthy
divides leave our boys riding double on the bicycle and embarrassed
to have their parents drive them anywhere. Bullies want to play
chicken,“living time bomb” Helen Hanft (Moonstruck)
warns teens not to “fuck with the Department of Motor Vehicles,”
and Fresh
Prince's Uncle
James Avery measures an uphill driving test with his perilous cup of
hot coffee. The rebellious, youthful lies seem so innocent until Les
says he's only going around the block but instead leaves his dad
stranded
in the street carrying the diapers. The boys are desperate to achieve
access to forbidden hang outs and quad roller skating babes but the
BMW hat is too big for the grounded sixteen year old. His mother's
false labor pains, running over the hedge, and not having a license
are the least of Les' problems when the police find a drunk girl in
the Caddy trunk! Small scratches and dents escalate to vomit in the
backseat and a drunk who thinks he's found a Maserati, yet there's a
certain effortlessness and nonchalant irony while casually backing
out with a maniac on the hood of the car. The
camera knows when to speed up with fun point of view action and well
edited cuts keep up the humorous pacing. Unlike today's superfluous
drone shots or bogged down special effects, in camera actions and
movements are used for scene transitions – keeping License
to Drive swift
and snappy as no sequence overstays its welcome.
Although License
to Drive does
rely on convenient timing for some of its comedy and plot advances,
the self-aware, winking attitude is part of the movie magic
suspension of disbelief. In scene action allows punchlines to fully
play out before callbacks to that hot cup of coffee and Driver's Ed
being one hell of a crash course send the golf clubs flying out the
broken rear windshield. Our little brother exclaims “Son of a
bitch!” as a ridiculous in labor race to the hospital via a falling
apart Caddy culminates in driving backwards the wrong way on the
sidewalk.
Of
course, we don't want the ever adorable Corey Haim to get caught
sneaking out of the house without a license! Viewers feel along for
the ride as another vicarious friend, and questions on if he had mono
making him sleep thru the entire driving course affirm the harmless
shenanigans before Les' dream night is hampered by his cautious old
lady driving and sixteen going on sixty worry over his classic ride.
License
to Drive lets
the characters, performances, and deliveries carry the humor with a
drunk driver slicing limes on the dashboard and taglines like “I'm
so dead they'll have to bury me twice.” Numerous quips from Haim
don't get their due justice in writing, such as his having to go home
with a stolen Beetle and claim that “this piece of shit is my
grandfather's Cadillac!” Superb parents Richard Masur (One
Day at a Time)
and the pregnant with every bizarre craving
Carol Kane (Scrooged)
likewise
have memorable laughs, anger, and hysterics.
Today Heather Graham's (Boogie
Nights) pink
dress and party attitude
is
almost demure – the popular girl accustomed to older men and fancy
clubs who's looking for something more while Corey
Feldman (the
'burbs)
gives speeches about the American Dream being the license in your
pocket to be free from the humiliation of riding the school bus.
Michael
Manasseri (Weird
Science)
may seem redundant in this The Two Coreys eighties heyday, however he
has some fun moments as the geeky straight man alongside Les' bookish
twin sister Nina Siemaszko (The
West Wing) and
her militant boyfriend Grant Heslov (Good
Night and Good Luck).
He's angry they are going to a protest against society's oppression
and materialism in an
“imperialist gas guzzler,” i.e. the family Audi.
From
the juicy posters in the boys' rooms, “Grandpa” license plates,
and a preposterous DOS computer glitch to the breaking the fourth
wall asides and humorous actions in the background, there are lots of
little things to see in License
to Drive.
Music cues, choice stings, and fatalistic echoes set off slow motion,
wide lenses, zooms, and spin outs as film making touches mirror the
teenage ups, downs, and permit torn in two. The boomboxes, chewed up
mixed tapes, corded phones, flash bulb camera, big computers, and
rolling up the windows invoke technological nostalgia, yet a parent's
denying his son a $23,000 BMW remains relatable. The slim ties,
blazers with rolled up sleeves, and acid wash jeans...not so much!
Perfectly timed Frank Sinatra irony and carefree Billy Ocean tunes
accent the likable characters and breezy joyride that aren't meant to
be taken too seriously. License
to Drive is
silly and flawed, absolutely. Did you have to live in the eighties to
fully appreciate its carefree adventure? Perhaps. Certainly there's
something to be said for manual vehicles without computers and
cameras that parallel park for you! Fortunately, License
to Drive
does what it sets out to do in creating a humorous night on the town.
Thanks to today's over analytical cinematic dire and dark buzzkill;
this slaphappy, all forgiven, consequence free, sunny
escapade
could not be made in the post-pandemic era. Get away from it all with
License
to Drive's
charming time capsule and
bemusing rite of passage.
