LEARNING TO DRIVE (2015)
Patricia Clarkson, Ben Kingsley, Jake Weber, Grace Gummer, Sarita Choudhury
Directed by Isabel Coixet
Spanish director Isabel Coixet’s latest film features two fine performances from actors Patricia Clarkson and Ben Kingsley. Based on an article in The New Yorker by Katha Pollitt, the film doesn’t break any new ground but it’s a pleasant way to spend a couple of hours at the cinema.
Patricia Clarkson plays Wendy Shields, a New York book critic whose husband, Ted (Jake Weber) just left her for another woman. Her daughter, Tasha (Grace Gummer), has quit college to work at a farm in Vermont and now Wendy is all alone in her Manhattan apartment, devastated by her husband’s affair.
On the night that Ted decides to tell Wendy he’s leaving her, the arguing couple step inside a taxi driven by Darwan (Ben Kingsley), a Sikh driving instructor who moonlights as a cab driver. Later that night he discovers a parcel accidently left behind by Wendy so the next day he stops by Wendy’s apartment to drop off the package. She notices the driving instructor sign atop his car and decides it’s about time she learned how to drive, that way she could go and visit her daughter in Vermont.
Although Wendy wants to be a licensed driver, she changes her mind, but Darwan asks her to just sit in the driver’s seat. She reluctantly agrees and before you know it lesson #1 is underway. At first Darwan is sympathetic towards Wendy’s separation from Ted and how it transpired in the back of his cab, and the two eventually become friends but there is a romance angle to the film that doesn’t quite work. Clarkson and Kingsley are great together but when he begins to develop feelings for her it just seems rather awkward in the film. There is also a subplot that involves Darwan entering into an arranged marriage with Jasleen (Sarita Choudhury, who made her acting debut opposite Denzel Washington in Mira Nair’s Mississippi Masala in 1991), a women from his native country that he’s never met, and so that situation also throws off the potential romance between Wendy and Darwan.
The film is beautifully shot and it moves along at a nice casual pace, however there are moments when the film’s tone escalates, usually when Wendy is having a fit of road or ex-husband rage, and when the turban-wearing Darwan becomes the victim of a racism.
“Learning to Drive” is a lighthearted look at companionship interspersed with some funny moments, plus its enjoyable watching two veterans like Clarkson and Kingsley in a film together.
(3 stars)
Now playing at Santikos Cinema Bijou (San Antonio), River Oaks Theater (Houston), Cinemark at Market Street (Woodlands), and Regal Arbor 8 (Austin).
Patricia Clarkson, Ben Kingsley, Jake Weber, Grace Gummer, Sarita Choudhury
Directed by Isabel Coixet
Spanish director Isabel Coixet’s latest film features two fine performances from actors Patricia Clarkson and Ben Kingsley. Based on an article in The New Yorker by Katha Pollitt, the film doesn’t break any new ground but it’s a pleasant way to spend a couple of hours at the cinema.
Patricia Clarkson plays Wendy Shields, a New York book critic whose husband, Ted (Jake Weber) just left her for another woman. Her daughter, Tasha (Grace Gummer), has quit college to work at a farm in Vermont and now Wendy is all alone in her Manhattan apartment, devastated by her husband’s affair.
On the night that Ted decides to tell Wendy he’s leaving her, the arguing couple step inside a taxi driven by Darwan (Ben Kingsley), a Sikh driving instructor who moonlights as a cab driver. Later that night he discovers a parcel accidently left behind by Wendy so the next day he stops by Wendy’s apartment to drop off the package. She notices the driving instructor sign atop his car and decides it’s about time she learned how to drive, that way she could go and visit her daughter in Vermont.
Although Wendy wants to be a licensed driver, she changes her mind, but Darwan asks her to just sit in the driver’s seat. She reluctantly agrees and before you know it lesson #1 is underway. At first Darwan is sympathetic towards Wendy’s separation from Ted and how it transpired in the back of his cab, and the two eventually become friends but there is a romance angle to the film that doesn’t quite work. Clarkson and Kingsley are great together but when he begins to develop feelings for her it just seems rather awkward in the film. There is also a subplot that involves Darwan entering into an arranged marriage with Jasleen (Sarita Choudhury, who made her acting debut opposite Denzel Washington in Mira Nair’s Mississippi Masala in 1991), a women from his native country that he’s never met, and so that situation also throws off the potential romance between Wendy and Darwan.
The film is beautifully shot and it moves along at a nice casual pace, however there are moments when the film’s tone escalates, usually when Wendy is having a fit of road or ex-husband rage, and when the turban-wearing Darwan becomes the victim of a racism.
“Learning to Drive” is a lighthearted look at companionship interspersed with some funny moments, plus its enjoyable watching two veterans like Clarkson and Kingsley in a film together.
(3 stars)
Now playing at Santikos Cinema Bijou (San Antonio), River Oaks Theater (Houston), Cinemark at Market Street (Woodlands), and Regal Arbor 8 (Austin).
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